HE Great Cyclone 



AT 



ST. LOUIS AND EAST ST. LOUIS, 

MAY 27, 1896. 



BEING A FULL HISTORY OF THE MOST TERRIFYING AND DESTRUCTIVE 
TORNADO IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, 

—WITH — 

NUMEROUS THRILLING AND PATHETIC INCIDENTS AND PERSONAL 

EXPERIENCES OF THOSE WHO WERE IN THE 

TRACK OF THE STORM. 

— ALSO— 

, Account of thb Wonderful Manifestations of Sympathy for the Ai ilicted in 
ALL Parts of the World. 

COMPILED AND EDITED EY 
THE distinguished AUTHOR AND LITERATEUR. 



SPLENDIDL Y ILL USTRA TED 

MTH 150 ACCURATE PHOTOGRAPHIC VIEWS AND ENGRAVINGS, PORTRAYING IN VIVID REALISM 
THE WRECK AND RUIN WROUGHT BY. THE DEMON OF DESTRUCTION. 



JGHT BY THE DEMON 



PtASE-TAYLOR PUBLISHING CO., 
ST. LOUIS. MO. 



r 



Copyright, 1896. 

BY 

Cyclone Publishing Co. 



By Transfer 

D. *' Public Library 

JUN 2 8 1940 



? V/ITHDRAWN 

^ WASHINGTON O. O. 

DEC -5 1901 

PAGE. 

pubi^ishers' notick - 15 - 16 

Introductory 17 - 20 

The Great Cyclone 21 

A Discriminating Storm 22 

The Cyclone's Fatal Path 25 

" ^^ the Elements of a Tornado 27 

rnings of Deadly Peril 31 

rathering Force in its Course... 32 

O- the Outskirts of the Storm Region. 34 

. e Full Force Felt 38 

W lere Deaths were Most Frequent... 40 

Tb^ Attack on the River 43 

The River a Raging Torrent 45 

u^sven Ladies in Deadly Peril 49 

'lue Damage in East St. Louis 51 

Jury's Narrow Escape 52 

Predicted a Year in Advance 56 

barometrical Readings 57 

[The Text of the Forecast 61 

[How Loss Could Have Been Lessened 63 

Death in the Wind 67 

[Cyclones of History 68 

I A Landmark in Irish Records 70 

■Storms in Our Own Land 73 

Victims of the Cyclone 75 

Surveying the Wreck 76 

A Suburb Desolated 80 

In an Older Section 85 

Mourning the Ruin of the Park 87 

pomes and Churches Destroyed 91 

In Old St. Louis Proper 93 

The City Hospital Wrecked 94 




6 CONTENTS. 

PAGE. 

Removing the Sufferers 97 

Physicians' Heroism 99 

Horrors at the Poor House 105 

Providential Escapes... 109 

Union Depot Power House Ill 

A Marvel of Re-Construction 115 

Street Railway Service Paralized 117 

Hours of Horrible Suspense 118 

Telegraph Wires Down 122 

A Fated Corner 123 

A Combination of Horrors 128 

Handsome Residences Destroyed 130 

Saw Her Children Burn 134 

Homeless and Destitute 135 

Horses Killed in Harness 139 

Desolation and Destruction 140 

Losses to Business Concerns 141 

Swamped By Their Neighbor 1^ 

Tremendous Damage 1^ 

Damage to Homes on One Street 1^ 

Around the City Hospital 1^ 

Many Dead in a Wrecked Territory 1! 

Nothing was Spared If 

Searching for Their Husbands 1' 

Gas Works Wrecked 1' 

Fallen Buildings Everywhere H 

Union Club Wrecked If 

Lives Lost in a Fire 1^ 

A Huge Factory Destroyed lOj 

Churches Wrecked 161 

A Quarter of a Million 16] 

Struck by the Tornado 17J 

An Appalling Loss 17| 

Damage East of Broadway 17^ 

Panic Among Factory Girls 17t 

Devastation's Awful Triumph 177"^ 



CONTENTS. 7 

PAGE. 

Station Torn up 181 

In North St. Louis 182 

Panic at the Races 183 

Rescued from a Wrecked Saloon Building 188 

Down- Town Wrecks 189 

Chamber of Commerce Unroofed 193 

Skyscrapers Escaped 195 

At the Court House 196 

At the Custom House 199 

Scenes at the Hotels 199 

Danger at the Jail 201 

Heartbreaking Spectacle 205 

Bringing in the Dead 207 

In East St. lyouis 211 

Prayed for Mercy 212 

Searching for the Dead 214 

A Hotel's Sad Role 214 

Scenes in the Hospitals 218 

The Babies Xaken and the Mothers Left 223 

When Morning Came 224 

The Death Roll 226 

The Missing 232 

Identified Dead in East St. Louis 237 

Aftermath of the Cyclone 238 

Insurance Companies Losses 242 

Indirect Losses 244 

Suffering Mechanics 248 

Telegraph Companies Overworked 249 

Two Days After the Calamity 255 

Visiting the Cyclone District 259 

Another Disaster Narrowly Averted 262 

One Hundred and Forty Thousand, Actual Count 2G6 

Half a Million Spectators 267 

Feeding the Hungry 271 

After the Crowds Had Gone 271 

Along Broadway 273 



8 CONTENTS. 

PAGE. 

Burying the Dead 277 

Sad Funeral Scenes 280 

An East St. Louis Funeral 284 

A Thieves' Opportunity 286 

Incidents of the Cyclone. 
Narrow Escapes, Deeds of Heroism, Records of Disaster and Deso- 
lation 289 

Fate of a Harding, HI., Merchant 291 

Swam for His Life 292 

Was Dug Out Unhurt 295 

Dug His Own Way Out :..., A 296 

Tried to Save Her Diamonds 296 

A Perilous Voyage 297 

Drifted to the Barracks 298 

Wheels in the Air 302 

Saved by a "Dumb Waiter" 303 

Mysterious Munn Family 304 

The Crime of Thieves 304 

Heroic Work Done by Ambulance Drivers 307 

Horse and a Live Wire Tangled 308 

True Brotherly Love 309 

How did it get the Dial 310 

Chief Gross was Rolled 310 

He Saved a City 313 

A Janitor's Fate 315 

Penned up for several hours in a Basement 316 

Alone in the World 319 

She Loved Her Dog 320 

Shanty Boats Escaped 321 

A Family nearly Exterminated 321 

Crazed by Grief 322 

A Pig's Souvenir 322 

Killed on His Way Home 325 

Capt. M. McMahon's Experience 326 

A Humorous Incident 328 

Tale of Two Families 331 



CONTENTS. 9 

PAGE. 

Rescued by an Officer 332 

Mrs. Bene's E)xperieuce 333 

A Jockey on Ice 337 

Contributed a |50 Suit 337 

He'll Never Say Die 338 

Plucky Girl 339 

A Coincidence ^. 339 

Pinioned in Debris 340 

A Barber's Story 344 

lier Daughter's Ashes 349 

A Man Lost His Reason - 350 

Battle of the Winds 351 

Families Broken up 355 

A Terrible Scatter 356 

A Man and Woman Blown Away 356 

Horse Rescued Alive 357 

It's an 111 Wind 359 

Typical Sadness 360 

A Wild and Awful Ride 360 

The Wind's Idiosyncracy 362 

How the Bird's Fared 363 

Some Curious Effects 364 

A Poor Refuge „ 367 

Crawled Under the Bridge Approach 367 

Alone with her Baby 368 

Mrs. Worheide's Experience 368 

An Adventurous and Costly Ride 369 

Broke Up a Wedding 371 

Eighty-Five Miles 372 

A Ride on the Wind 373 

A Kindly Deed 374 

Another Ivucky Escape 375 

The Chinese and the Storm 376 

Henry Wedermeyer's Experience 376 

Uneasiness of Shanty Boat Owners 377 

Strange Freaks of the Wind 379 



10 CONTENTS. 

PAGE, 

A Trunk Mystery 380 

Havlin's Theatre Damaged 381 

Engine House Completely Demolished 381 

Killed Almost Opposite the Morgue 383 

Panic Among I^aundry Girls 383 

A Priest's Escape 385 

Died in their Arms 386 

Hero of Balaklava Dead 388 

Found Safety in a Basement 388 

How the Horses Behaved 389 

Mrs. Eyerman's Miraculous Escape 391 

Gave His Life to Save a Horse 392 

"Saved through God's Mercy" 393 

Strange But True 395 

Horse Unharnessed 396 

Pet Cat Found 397 

Exchange Members Timid 399 

A Flying Stool and a Doll House 400 

Three Uttle Ones Died 400 

Blown into the River 401 

Paper Hanger's Experience 402 

Saved his Drink 403 

Wedged in a Car Roof 403 

Died from Fright 404 

In a Fire-Proof Vault 404 

Two Women's Escape 405 

Sir Charles Gibson's Trees 405 

Colored Victims 407 

Willie Winckler's Death 407 

Acts of Heroism 408 

Saved his Captain's Son : 409 

Cabby was an Autocrat 411 

Dying in a Drug Store 412 

A Panic Averted 413 

Train's Narrow Escape 415 

Found a Dead Baby 416 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGE. 

Entrance to Lafayette Park 23 

Lafayette Park Presbyterian Church 24 

General View in Lafayette Park after the Storm 29 

Washington Statue, Lafayette Park 30 

View from Relay Depot, East St. Louis 35 

Wreck of Dr. Eyerman's Residence and Rear Portions of Union 

Club 36 

Residence of August Ahrens, Whittemore Place 41 

View on Mississippi Avenue 42 

Residence of August Nasse, near Lafayette Park 47 

Residence on Compton Heights 48 

Leonori's Storage House, South Jefferson Avenue 53 

Portion of City Hospital 54 

Front View of People's R. R. Power House on Park Avenue 59 

Power house of Union Depot R. R. Co., on Geyer Avenue 60 

Residence of Henry Roeder, Ann, near California Avenue 65 

Lafayette Park Methodist Church 66 

Side View of Lafayette Park Methodist Church 71 

Purina Mills, Twelfth and Gratiot Streets 72 

The Benton Statue, Lafayette Park 77 

Lafayette Avenue, Looking West from Missouri Avenue 78 

Lafayette Avenue, Looking East from Jefferson Avenue 83 

Wreck of the Duestrow House 84 

Scene on Lafayette Avenue 89 

East St. Louis Transfer Co 90 

St. Louis German Evangelical Church 95 

Koerner's Garden 96 

Anchor Hall 101 

Residence of Dr. Starkloflf 102 

Residence of Dr. Hauck 107 

Scene on Mississippi Avenue 108 

(11) 



12 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE. 

General View of Lafayette Park 113 

Residence on Park Avenue 114 

Bxcelsior Laundry 119 

St. Louis Jail 120 

Wreck of Steamer "Henry Sackman" 125 

Ottenad Furniture Co 126 

Seventh and Rutger Streets 131 

Russell Avenue, East of Oregon Avenue 132 

Mt. Calvary Episcopal Church 137 

Waverly Place 138 

St. Louis Cotton Compress Warehouse 143 

Gundlach Three-story Tenement House 144 

Bast St. Louis Gas Works 149 

Ploehn's Furniture Factory - 150 

Elevator at Chouteau Avenue and Levee 155 

East St. Louis Electric Power House 156 

Douglas School, East St. Louis 101 

Residence of Dr. E. Preetorius 162 

National Hotel, East St. Louis 167 

Court House, East St. Louis 168 

Agricultural Warehouse on Carroll Street 173 

Mt. Calvary Church 174 

Front View of Anchor Hall 179 

Side View of Hodgen School 180 

D. M. Osborne & Co.'s Building 185 

Residence on Park Avenue 186 

Wrecked Home on Oregon Avenue 191 

Sample of the Storm's Rage on Park Avenue 192 

Interior View of 0<^tenad Furniture Co.'s Building 197 

Wrecked Trees in Lafayette Park 198 

M. M. Buck & Co.'s Warehouse.. 203 

View on Lafayette Avenue £04 

Church on Mississippi Avenue 209 

Collins' Livery Stable 210 

Mauchenheimer Place, Seventh and Rutger Streets 215 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 13 

PAGE. 

Residence of John EJndres 216 

Scene on Lafayette Avenue 221 

Overturned Cars on Eigiith and Park Avenue 222 

A Ruined Home 227 

Eads Bridge, East Side 228 

Residence on Compton Heights 233 

Wrecked Steamer ? 234 

Desolated Homes 239 

Union Club 240 

Albany Dancing Academy 245 

On Third Street 246 

St. John of Nepomuk Church 251 

Wreck of an Elevator 252 

Freak of the Storm on Clifton Heights 257 

Scene on Jefferson Avenue 258 

Steamer " Exporter" 263 

A Dreary Waste 264 

Music Stand, Lafayette Park, Before the Storm 269 

Music Stand, Lafayette Park, After the Storm 270 

Hopeless Ruins 275 

A Fallen Giant in the Park 276 

Front View of City Hospital 281 

Alone in the Ruins 282 

Memorial Home 287 

View of Schnaider's Garden 288 

Ann and California Avenues 293 

Century Building 294 

View Across From City Hospital 299 

Bridge and Wreck of Martell House, East St. Louis..^ 300 

Geyer and Ohio Avenues 305 

Laclede Gas Company's Works 306 

Hodgen School 311 

Headquarters Relief Committee 312 

Baptist Church, Lafayette and Mississippi Avenues 317 

Dolman and Hickory Streets , ,..,. 318 



14 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE. 

Texas and Allen Avenues 323 

Where Children Dwelt 324 

The Summer House in Lafayette Park 327 

Unity Church 329 

View at Twelfth and Gratiot Streets 330 

A Sad Home-Coming 335 

A Picturesque Ruin 336 

Republican Convention Hall 341 

A Promiscuous Wreck 342 

Outside View Liggett & Myers Tobacco Factory 347 

Second View Liggett & Myers Tobacco Factory 348 

Liggett & Myers New Tobacco Factory 353 

Trinity Church : •- 354 

Electric Car Blown from the Bridge 358 

Scene on Chouteau Avenue 362 

Union Dairy Company 366 

Bast of Lafayette Park 370 

Advance Elevator " B" 374 

Wreck of Elevator on the Levee 378 

All that was Left of a Beautiful Home 382 

Imperial Laundry 386 

Fourteenth and Papin Streets 390 

Brown Tobacco Company's Building 394 

Tri-Angle Warehouse 398 

Wrecked and Blistered 402 

St. Louis Wire Mills 406 

Coming Home After the Storm 410 

Singular Freak of the Wind 414 



PUBLISHERS' NOTICE 



SEVERAL business men, prominently connected with the 
relief movement in behalf of the cyclone sufferers, sug- 
gested that a book ought to be prepared giving a full history of 
the storm and its devastations, with a compilation of the many 
tragic and remarkable incidents connected therewith. Such a 
book, it was believed, would have a large circulation in all parts 
of the country, and supply a want that was manifest in the 
eager demand for news about the great tornado. It was also 
proposed that a certain liberal percentage of the receipts from 
the sales of the book should be donated to the relief fund, thus 
extending material aid in that direction while satisfying the 
desire for an authentic and permanent record of the most 
destructive and frightful calamity of the century. 

This volume is the result of the suggestion referred to. Ten 
per cent, of the gross receipts will be assigned to the relief 
fund, to be used either for immediate necessities, or employed 
in assisting those who have lost their all in the destruction of 
their little homes, to re-establish themselves and make a new 
start in life, as the committees having these matters in charge 
may deem advisable. 

The nom de pluine of ** Julian Curzon," as editor and com- 
piler, will be recognized as that of one of the most brilliant and 
popular magazine writers of the day, and his connection with 
the work is a sufficient guarantee of its accuracy and literary 
excellence. Mr. Curzon, however, claims no credit for the 
splendid descriptive matter that occurs in these pages; this in 
a very large degree is due to the brilliant staff writers of the 

(15) 



16 publishers' notice. 

local press, whose articles have been collated and used as the 
basis of this work. But Mr. Curzon's active work in aid of the 
sufferers, his own personal experience and losses during the 
cyclone, and his connection with the various relief committees, 
made him acquainted with many singular and tragic incidents 
that have not been published elsewhere, and these are treated 
in his own brilliant and fascinating style. 

The main description of the cyclone, its fury and its terror- 
inspiring horrors, is largely composed of that splendid and 
wonderfully brilliant report that appeared in ^'The Republic" 
the second day after the storm, which has attracted world-wide 
notice and comment as one of the finest examples of superb 
descriptive composition that has ever appeared in print. 

The publishers of this work also desire to give due credit to 
the "Globe-Democrat," the "Post-Dispatch," the "Star," and 
the" Chronicle" for the use of material selected from their 
columns. In no other city could the press have displayed more 
energy, good taste, or literary ability in the handling of such 
an overwhelming calamity than was manifested by the great 
newspapers of St. Louis. 

Our copyright is intended to protect the title and general 
form of the book, as well as a number of special photographic 
views that were taken for this work exclusively. The excel- 
lence of the views in general is due to the superiority of the 
workmanship and artistic conception of the local photographers, 
from whom they were purchased. They were all taken within 
one or two days after the storm, and represent the ruins as they 
then appeared. 

The Publishers. 

St. Louis, June 10, 1896. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



WE shall never know the full extent of the suffering caused 
by the tornado which devastated a section of St. Louis, 
Missouri, and a still larger portion of East St. Louis, Illinois, 
on the afternoon of Wednesday, May 27, 1896. It is known 
that more than three hundred people were killed and more than 
a thousand injured. It is known that a great portion of the 
city of East St. Louis was razed to the ground, and that South 
of and along the Mill Creek Valley in St. Louis, the cyclone 
cut for itself a wide path through block after block of residence 
property. 

But it is difficult to even approximate the property loss and 
an accurate statement will never be made. The first estimates 
placed the total at $50,000,000. These figures have since been 
scaled down, but the total remains appalling. No estimate of 
loss can include the individual suffering, or the deprivation 
endured in silence by those, who too proud to ask relief, sought 
such shelter as was available and formed secret and praise- 
worthy resolutions to begin life over again. 

In but a few minutes the savings of a lifetime were, in many 
instances, scattered to the four winds of heaven. Many were 
thankful to escape with their lives, absolutely penniless. There 
was not even time for them to secure possession of their pocket- 
books and little keepsakes and mementoes. Death, destruction 
and desolation went hand in hand, and together brought about a 
reign of sadness and mourning, such as modern or ancient history 
but rarely records. 

2 (17) 



18 INTRODUCTORY. 

One St. Louis citizen who was away from home at the time 
of the accident, stated on his return that but for the information 
imparted in the press, he never would have believed that the 
ruin could have been wrouf^ht except by the cannonade of an 
immense army, equipped with modern artillery. In describing 
his sensations on witnessing the scene of devastation he said that 
he was in Charleston just after the earthquake, and had entered 
more cities than one just after they had been stormed during the 
Civil War. But, he added, he had never seen destruction so 
complete or ruin so absolute as that wrought by the tornado, 
whose merciless devastation beggars description and calls for 
the use of wor^ls which would have to be coined for the occasion. 

St. Louis is situated in the Mississippi Valley, on the western 
bank of the Father of Waters. A quarter of a century ago a 
cyclone blew through the neighborhood, causing great destruc- 
tion in East St. Louis, but comparatively little on the Missouri 
shore. Since then there had been two or three trifling earth- 
quake shocks. None of these had been sufficient to do any 
damage, nor had the thunder and wind storms which visited 
the city from time to time, wrought serious damage or caused 
general inconvenience. 

The periodical floods in the Mississippi River, the last some 
four years ago, did great damage in East St. Louis, but practi- 
cally none in St. Louis itself. In fact the people of the great 
metropolis of the Mississippi Valley States had for a quarter of 
a century been free from calamities of wind or water. The 
feeling of security had become general, and among the younger 
inhabitants particularly, it was thought that no cyclone or 
tornado was ever likely to penetrate the hills around the city 
and enter within its boundaries. The calamity at Sherman, 



INTRODUCTORY. 19 

Texas, had shocked every thinking man in St. Louis and a large 
fund had been raised for the relief of the sufferers in the Texas 
town. Many who subscribed liberally to the fund were them- 
selves in need of assistance by the time the cyclone had reached 
and passed through their own city. 

The awakening from this feeling of security was a rude one. 
The fatal day dawned with no exceptional occurrence. There 
was no friendly warning — there was no cry of ''Flee from the 
wrath to come." True a cyclone had been unofficially pre- 
dicted for the closing days of May, but the warning was not 
regarded, nor did those who were aware of it, dream that 
St. Louis itself would be. smitten. Business was conducted as 
usual, nor was there anything in the condition of the \\eather 
early in the day to warrant any exceptional fear, or even 
thought. The weather bureau predicted local thunder storms, 
but said nothing of a cyclone, a tornado or even an exceptional 
wind. The sun shone as usual, but was frequently obstructed 
by clouds which towards noon became more numerous and 
threatening in appearance. The barometer began to fall with 
a steady persistency which alarmed those who have made a 
study of weather conditions, and who have learned what to 
expect from peculiar atmospheric conditions. 

No one could tell the main direction of the wind, which 
seemed to come during the early afternoon in tits and starts 
from all points of the compass, veering around with sudden 
jerks. Towards three o'clock it became more settled from the 
Northwest with a number of sub-currents from different direc- 
tions, which brought in masses of clouds. Gradually darkness 
seemed to approach and although the officials in the Weather 
Bureau Observatory do not seem even at this late period of the 



20 INTRODUCTORY. 

day to have anticipated a calamity, many people began to fear 
the worst. In one office building in particular the word was 
passed around that a cyclone was heading towards the city with 
lightning rapidity and that unless it was deflected from its 
course, a terrible calamity might be looked for. 

Some received the warning as a jest, but others hurried to 
their homes and in some cases to their death. The office buildings 
of the city withstood the shock in a manner which redounds to 
the credit of their designers and constructors, although of course 
the full brunt of the storm did not strike them. It was the 
residence houses which for the most part were destroyed, and 
these were the most insecure places in which imaginary refuge 
could be sought. 

At 4:30 it became obvious that the atmospheric conditions 
were unprecedented in the recollection of the people. The 
temperature fell rapidly and huge banks of black and greenish 
clouds were seen approaching the city. It gradually became 
darker and at 5 o'clock it was as dark in many parts of the city 
as is usually the case at the end of May, three hours later in the 
evening. 

All the time the wind kept rising and in the far distance vivid 
forks of lightning could be seen. Gradually the thunder storm 
came nearer the city and the Avestern portion was soon in the 
midst of a terrible storm. The wind's velocity was about thirty- 
seven miles an hour. This speedily increased to sixty, seventy 
and even eighty miles, by the time the storm was at its height. 
For thirteen minutes this frightful speed was maintained and 
the rain fell in ceaseless torrents, far into the sad and never-to- 
be-forgotten night. J. C. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE 



The Storm King and the Fire King combined in the 
attack on St. Louis. And right bravely did they fight. 
The air was filled with light and heavy debris, tributes 
to the might of the wind. In all directions the clang of 
the gongs of the fire engines and suddenly in the south 
there shot in the air a stream of flame that lit up the 
whole city. The Fire King had scored his first point in 
the assault. A big skylight came sailing past the observ- 
atory tower, circled around in the air, made a dive for 
Olive street and was stopped by the gutter along the 
building. Then down in the street could be seen the 
results of the attack of the invading hosts on the subtle 
agent of man, electricity. In every direction the long 
lines of telegraph poles were flashing pillars of blue 
flame. The wires were strings of fire and the insulators 
were blazing bunches of sizzling wires. 

Buildings swayed and creaked in the powerful blast. 
The wind came down in the streets, picked up buggies 
and turned them over. It bounded to roofs, rolled up 
tin coverings like scrolls and deposited them in telegraph 
wares. It filled the air with flying bricks and timbers and 
made the ears horrified with the crash of falling signs and 
breaking windows and the shrieks of men and w^omen. 
And all over the city fire engines hurried to and fro and 
flames broke out in such a multitude of places that the 

(21) 



22 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

hearts of the brave firemen sank within them when they 
contemplated the possibilities of a general conflagration. 
But in this the allied forces of wind and fire worked at 
cross purposes. For the rain served to largely undo the 
work of the other elements. 

It was 5:35 when the army of the air withdrew from 
the assault. Then the rain came down in torrents and 
drenched the throngs hurrying through the streets. It 
was a wonderful rain, a steady, pounding, penetrating 
rain that seemed to gather strength as it fell. Amid the 
horror and the wild rumors of countless fatalities the rain 
came down harder and stronger, gloomily sounding a 
knell. 

A DISCRIMIISrATING STORM. 

Had the arch-fiend himself directed the course of the 
tornado he could have scarcely guided it so as to have 
done more damage. Those who gazed upon the scene of 
desolation that was wrought were almost inclined to hint 
that it was guided by a strategist, so marvelous was its 
perspicacity. The forces at its command were handled 
with the skill and judgment a general of power might con- 
ceive. Carefully avoiding obstacles that might seriously 
scatter its concentrated power, it passed lightly over cer- 
tain places in its path and smote others hip and thigh. 
Now and then it divided, but the divisions were strong 
in destructiveness, and where the main storm did not 
wreak its full force there was damage done in spots by 
wandering skirmishing blasts that appal and horrify. It 
switched and twisted and dodged with the skill of a 




23 




24 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 25 

wrestler. And after inflicting damage sufficient to wear 
out any but the mightiest tempest, it still had strength 
enough to cross a great sheet of water like the Mississippi 
and spread ruin and desolation with a lavish hand. 
Though the tornado ravished the people of lives and 
property, they respect it for its power and ingenuity. 

The rain and darkness of the night had the effect of 
bringing to the minds of those who worked in the afflicted 
districts the thought that experience shows what looks 
bad and terrible in the dark, generally turns out to be an 
exaggerated fancy in the morning. But the sun that rose 
smiling on St. Louis and her stricken sister city across 
the river the following morning, brought to light new hor- 
ror with every ray that penetrated the atmosphere. It 
was not until the earth was bright and warm and the sky 
was clear and glad that the true situation dawned upon 
the people. The awful work of the devastating army of 
the elements stood out in all its naked hideousness. 
From the west to the east in the southern central portion 
of the town a wide streak was blazed, lined on each side 
with wreckage that represented to those who owned it 
when it was useful, a loss total and stunning. 

THE CYCLON^e's FATAL PATH. 

The path of the storm through the city was about seven 
miles long. It was not a direct path, leading straight 
from the point at which it effected entrance to where it 
left. It made a path like a snake striving to gain a place 
of known refuge from a pursuing enemy. Now and then it 
diverged from the Mill Creek Valley on one side or the 



26 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

other, but only to return at some vulnerable point with 
renewed energy. It seemed to move at a height above 
the ground that sheltered the low places in its path until 
after it passed the City Hospital. Then it came closer to 
the earth, and the damage wrought from Twelfth street 
to the river shows that it rushed directly down the incline 
to the Levee. 

"Where it first entered the city, out near the Poorhouse, 
on Arsenal street, the force of the storm was exerted 
against trees and scattered buildings. The first indica- 
tion of the real force of the wind was made apparent at 
Jefferson and Geyer avenues, where the big power house 
of the Union Depot street railway system, one of the 
largest electric plants in the world, was razed, damage 
to be measured only by the hundred thousand dollars, be- 
inor wrouojht. A block further north the destruction was, 
if possible, even more emphatically manifested in the 
wrecking of the Union Club building, and the almost 
total demolition of dozens of buildings in the immediate 
vicinity. 

The force generated at this corner was not lost while 
the storm continued on its way east until after it left La- 
fayette Park, and there was no extraordinary manifesta- 
tion until it reached the ill-fated corner of Seventh and 
Rutger streets. Here it spent the full vent of some of its 
reserve fury, and then moved onto Soulard Market, which 
formed another center of destruction, wider and longer than 
either of the others. 

While the chief force of the storm was exerted at the 
three places mentioned, there were others scarcely more 



thp: great cyclone. 27 

fortunate in the matter of locality in its path. Tower 
Grov^e Station, where the mammoth plant of the Liggett 
<fe Myers Tobacco Company was destroyed, was the first 
point where the surrounding circumstances warranted the 
wind in extending itself. When it reached the river it 
met a wide stretch of waste that allowed it to gather force 
and gave the scattered clouds a chance to rejoin the main 
body in the assault u[)on East St. Louis. But at no time 
was there any diminution in the vigor of such portions of 
the tornado as reached the earth. The scattering edges 
of it completed the waste the main body emphasized in 
spots. 

ALL THE ELEMENTS OF A TORNADO. 

There can be no doubt that the storm was a tornado 
rather than a cyclone. The local weather bureau ob- 
server, in explaining this point, says : 

'^It was at first believed that the storm was entirely a 
straight wind rush, without any evidences of the tornadic 
whirl. Further investigation late in the afternoon by 
one of our observers tends to confirm the opinion of many 
that the storm in a few circumscribed localities was a 
genuine 'twister.' This appears to have been the fact 
around Lafayette Park and on Chouteau avenue between 
Ninth and Twelfth streets. In these places the debris 
lay in every direction, and in the park trees had been 
torn up by the roots and thrown around in confusion, in- 
dicating the presence of the inward spiral- and upward 
motion which is characteristic of tlie true tornado. This 
also accounjts for the presence of the southwest wind 



28 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

while the general direction during the storm was from 
the northwest. In the tornadic whirl the wmd would 
have an inward rotary motion, and as the center of dis- 
turbance progressed the wind would shift accordingly to 
the different points of the compass. It is probable that 
this southwest wind was of greater velocity than that 
from the northwest, according to one of the accepted 
general theories of cyclonic circulation, namely, that the 
heaviest wind may be expected in the southwest quad- 
rant of a low area, and the heaviest rain in the southeast 
quadrant. No other evidences of the true tornado have 
thus far been obtained." 

Apart from scientific observation there can be no doubt 
as to the tornado motion of the storm. Any man who 
looked at Lafayette Park on Thursday morning and then 
said there was not a rotary motion in the wind that tore 
down the kings of tlie forest, must have been afflicted 
with a disease that called for the use of a strabismometer. 
They fell to the north and to the south and to the east 
and to the west. If one had the time and the inclina- 
tion — and perhaps the mind to figure it out — he could, 
while in Lafayette Park, have determined just about the 
number of times the storm cloud twisted in going across 
the inclosure. 

But one did not have to go to Lafayette Park for proof 
that St. Louis was assailed by a storm with a rotary 
movement. Almost any cross street in its path fur- 
nished the evidence. On one street trees on the west 
side were blown down to the west and trees on the east 
side were blown to the east. On the next street east the 









29 




30 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 31 

order was reversed. There are corners in South St. 
Louis on which buildings stood that give unmistakable 
evidence of having been struck by wind coming from 
more than one point of the compass at the same time. 

WARNINGS OF DEADLY PERIL. 

We have seen that although not officially predicted, 
the tornado was expected by many. The position of 
several of the dead bodies found in the wreckage indi- 
cated attempts to secure places of safety which must have 
been commenced long before the storm reached the city, 
or its suburbs. The cloud movements all the afternoon 
created alarm in the minds of those who had spent any 
length of time on the prairies in the West. The peculiar 
shades of green the vault of heaven assumed, denoted to 
the eye of the man who has gone through tornadoes where 
there are no compact communities to break them up, a 
state of affairs in the atmosphere calculated to provoke 
alarm. The scurrying clouds, sweeping about with ap- 
parently no object in view, were plainly bent upon a 
mission of destruction. On account of the popular fal- 
lacy that a tornado or a cyclone will not strike a large 
city there was created a feeling of false security. But 
men who know about those things were worried. Women 
who knew about them prudently made preparations to 
seek places of safety should the conditions warrant the 
passage of the storm over the great area of the town. 

The gathering of the clouds in the west preparatory to 
the assault of the city was one of the grandest spectacles 
ever given the view of the eye of man, but it did not com- 



32 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

pare with the terrific grandeur of the onslaught. When the 
allied forces from the southwest and the northeast, laden 
with lightning and cumulative force, retired beyond the 
western horizon for a few minutes, shortly after 6 o'clock, 
Wednesday afternoon, and the rain came blowing in soft 
sheets from the south, it was thought that there would 
be no further disturbance. But the army of lightning 
and winds had gone for re -enforcements. Away out be- 
yond the limits of the county there was another storm 
raging, a malignant storm that spent its force in doing 
damage of small moment in comparison with what it might 
do if joined to a greater combination. The whirling bank 
of clouds went out in St. Louis County and gathered up 
the angry elements warring there. It took about two 
minutes to make the consolidation and then came the com- 
bined attack. 

GATHERING FORCE IN ITS COURSE. 

The fearful combination of aerial forces which wrecked 
thousands of buildings and broke up as many homes, grew 
in strength as it dashed through the city in its death deal- 
ing course. The storm it had gathered in its ranks out 
in the high ground west of the city was not fully settled 
in position and confusion reigned in place of the discipline 
that predominated in a few minutes. In the center there 
was a thick mass of fighting strength, but the outside 
ranks were weak and wavering, prone to wander off with 
each fancy of the wind. Coming down toward the Poor- 
house the rotary motion, the secret of the tornado's power, 
began to make itself apparent to a visible extent. The 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 33 

army of clouds, from the shape of a drawn out ac- 
cordion, partook more of the shape of a screw, with the 
small end, the effective end, dangling towards the earth. 
Once the cloud was formed the onslaught was inevitable. 
The wind took up the course that drew the storm toward 
the city and the city was doomed. No human power 
could stay the rush. 

In a tempest of discordant sound the tornado swooped 
down on the Poorhouse, worked its will and continued 
on its way. The- Femal^ i^?fW^'^^' i^^^ across the street, 
was right in its p/^ite?^!i,Wgaries of a tornado are 
hard to understand!^^f^W6K?^ slight trend to the east 
and south, clippejj)g^«i^ j-ggl oi the west wing of the 
Female Hospital, and then with the big Insane Asylum 
looming up before it, full of possibilities for horrible 
execution, it shifted once more to the south and took up 
a path that brought it over the asylum farms. 

Upon reaching King's Highway the tornado was in a 
fair way to last on a voyage through the city. The scat- 
tering clouds on the edges were rapidly closing in on the 
central mass, and the screw shape was becoming more 
pronounced. From the direction it was traveling it 
seemed, when it passed the Insane Asylum, to be bound 
for Carondelet, but the strategy and ingenuity that actu- 
ated its movements came into play and steered it to a path 
more productive of loss of property and life. 

Koerner's Garden — the mecca of the cyclist, and of the 
convival generally — stands, or we sliould rather say, stood 
on the corner of Kings highway and Arsenal street. 
When the tornado was two blocks away from it to the 



34 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

south one would have sworn it was on its way directly 
east. But it wheeled suddenly in its course and made a 
dash for Koerner's. The momentum it had attained 
toward the east was too strong to allow it to strike the 
garden direct, but it made a good, honest effort at demo- 
lition, and then went on its way to Tower Grove Park, 
directly to the northeast. It tore across Tower Grove 
Park in a diagonal direction, gathering strength as it 
traveled, leveling trees and uprooting plants and shrubs, 
and then struck out over the hill for the lovely dwellings 
on Compton Heights. Away to the east, down in the 
valley, the big buildings of the Liggett ife Myers tobacco 
plant reared their heads to the sky, and the great steel 
girders seemed to attract the tornado as a magnet attracts 
steel. It paused a moment in the rush to Compton 
Heights, took on a stronger rotary motion and sped away 
for the tobacco buildings. 

ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF THE STORM REGION. 

But the effort of changing the course so suddenly had 
a rather demoralizing effect on the army of clouds. A 
detachment of the solid platoon went away on an expedi- 
tion of its own down toward the breweries and the peace- 
ful German homes surroundino; them in far South St. 
Louis. The main body, scarcely affected by the loss of 
the deserter, continued on its way, and death and ruin a 
second later reigned in the big steel structures at the 
Tower Grove Crossing. 

At this time the mass of clouds seemed to spread. 
The top of the mass flattened and swung from side to 



l^. -^.;^«ii 






<! 

M 

O 

w 

> 
< 


w 

O 
H 

W 
> 










; «^-^ ^'^ 







41- 






35 




86 



THTJ a RE AT CYCLONE. S'T 

side with a motion that threw the small end about like a 
pendulum over the country in a most promiscuous man- 
ner. It bobbed up and down, now striking the earth 
and tearing a streak of waste in its path, now high above, 
the force it expended doing damage slighter than direct 
application of the rotary motion accomplished. The rain 
was falling in torrents and the sky was veiled in a muddy 
mist that cast a gloom on the earth more terrifying than 
the darkness of night. 

From the point where the tornado started in the attack 
on Compton Heights the wonderful and peculiar move- 
ments it took became apparent. While the body of the 
cloud was hanging over the residence district the tail, the 
destructive end, was creating havoc half a mile to the 
north in the factory district along the Missouri Pacific 
and Iron Mountain tracks. Just before reaching Grand 
avenue the storm got together again, dropped down 
toward the earth and made a charge on the hill it had 
been approaching. 

Trees went down before it, houses were unroofed, walls 
were blown this way and that, and it appeared that the 
entire population of Compton Hill would be blown clear 
over the reservoir. But the tornado took another track. 
Instead of breaking itself against the side of the incline 
leading west from Grand avenue it took a sudden bound 
in the air, passed clear over Grand avenue and the Reser- 
voir Park and continued on its way over the valley be- 
tween Jefferson and Grand avenues toward the more 
densely populated part of the city. 

Though the storm did not directly strike here, it had 



38 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

a few guerrilla clouds out that accomplished much in the 
way of destruction. These vagrant fighters against prop- 
erty and life skimmed along close to the earth, dodged 
around obstacles that were beyond their power to remove 
and tore and tugged at towers and roofs and trees. As 
they flew by, the main storm, mounting higher and 
higher, seemed to lose them, but they kept on, straight 
to the east. Meanwhile the tail was slowly swinging out 
to the north and the cloud flattened to a more pronounced 
degree. 

THE FULL FORCE FELT. 

Clear down to Michigan avenue the little skirmishing 
clouds did all the execution for the storm. Crossins; this 
street the small end suddenly swooped downward, and at 
the same time the upper end began to swing around in 
such a way as to bring the cloud into an almost perpen- 
dicular position. At Ohio avenue the full force of the 
armament of the army of clouds was thrown at the earth 
for a second and buildings fell in every direction. The 
center of tlie storm was at this time directly over Lafayette 
avenue, and. the tail again began to diverge to the north, 
with a graceful swing. The front of the advancing phalanx 
of deadly vapor was right on a line with tlie surface of 
Jefferson avenue. 

Lafayette Park is on the summit of a hill that forms 
the western boundary of the valley extending up to the 
high ground along Grand avenue. Jefferson avenue is 
slightly down the incline to the west of the ])ark. If the 
tornado had pursued the same antics that governed it 



THE GliP:AT CYCLONE. 39 

when it reached Grand avenue, it would have again 
bounded in the air about Jetferson av^enue and continued 
on its way toward the river at a different altitude to save 
from serious damage the beautiful residences about the 
park. But the actuating power showed strategy this 
time. There was not much to destroy at Grand avenue, but 
Jefferson avenue offered a rich harvest. And when the 
storm reached that thoroughfare it dashed straight into 
the side of the hill, the destructive tail swung east as far as 
Chouteau avenue, dashed toward the earth and bit a chunk 
of property out of Jefferson avenue all the way from 
Chouteau to Russell. The tail of the storm moved from 
north to south like the lash of a whip, and while it was 
completing the work of destruction the dense main body 
remained poised in the air, slowly revolving and floating 
in the direction of Geyer avenue. 

About the time it was directly over the Scullin power 
house the tail came along, swept under, and with a roar 
that was heard for blocks, mixed motors, engines, cars, 
buildings, machinery and men in a mass of matter. Then 
the tail swung over to the South Side race track, com- 
pletely licked it off the face of the earth, and the great 
body, flashing lightning and breathing thunder, moved 
swiftly to the northeast, blowing down houses and strip- 
ping Lafayette Park on the way, leaving it a forest of 
splintered stumps. 

The movements of the tail of the storm — the twisting 
tail that curled and splintered iron and steel and melted 
away the strongest work of man, then moved so rapidly 
from one side to the other that it could not be distin- 



40 TIIK GREAT CYCLONE. 

guished. It slipped over to Twenty-first street, des- 
troyed elevators, wire mills, warehouses and factories, 
and then considerately jumped over a big brewery at the 
south approach to the Eighteenth street bridge. It sent 
an arm over to Market street and blew holes in the walls 
of factories, but spared the Union Station. Then it 
gathered all its force, swept back to the south again, 
wiped the City Hospital out of existence and started on 
the voyage down Soulard street, the most destructive in 
its campaign. All the time the big black cloud hovered 
above, sliding up and down, spitting, lightning and 
raining. 

WHERE DEATHS ^VERE MOST FREQUENT. 

From the City Hospital to the corner of Seventh and 
Rutger streets the storm gathered itself together for a 
final onslauo^ht before reachino^ the river. All the little 
tormentors were drawn into the vortex and they did not 
forget their work of destruction as they came from every 
side for blocks around. The terrible tail was drawn up 
into the main cloud as though for additional strength, 
and at Eighth street the entire mass dropped to the earth 
and spread dozens of whirling dealers of death to the 
north and south. Men and women and children died 
here like flies in the cold. The streets were blocked with 
debris, while the awful tail whipped up and down, and 
from side to side like something infuriated. The tornado 
tarried here, but not for Ions;. It worked fast. 

From the scene of carnage on Rutger and Soulard 
streets, from Broadway to Eighth, and as far north as 




41 




42 



THE (IREAT CYCLONE. 48 

Chouteau avenue and south as Shenandoah, the tornado 
gathered together again and went bounding toward the 
river. Part of it cut loose from the main body and started 
on a voyage to the north over the downtown business dis- 
trict, but the strong army was in the cloud bound for the 
last stand in the battle on this side of the river. All 
along the bank it twisted and tore elevators and ware- 
houses, and those the w^ind did not reach lightning set 
fire to, so that nothing or next to nothing escaped. 

The storm next readied the Mississippi river, made 
the levee and harbor a desolate waste, blew steamers and 
wharves to the other shore, and lashed the water to waves 
of proportions never seen in this vicinity before. Above 
the Eads bridge the squadron that broke away in South 
St. Louis rejoined the main body somewdiere in the 
stream, and the united army went into East St. Louis, 
scarcely tired from the long flying battle that extended 
over eight miles of disputed territory in the Mound City 
and on the river. 

THE ATTACK ON THE RIVER. 

The first reports of the loss of life and injury to limb 
sustained by that portion of the tornado-swept district 
along the river front were, as was natural in the excite- 
ment of the moment, exaggerated. After a careful can- 
vass of the situation, it was found that the loss of life was 
comparatively smaller on the river than in any other 
section visited by the storm. The ofiicers of the various 
steamboat companies made careful inquny into the mat- 
ter, so far as the means at their command allowed, and 



44 THE ORE AT CYCLONE. 

nearly all of their employes and passengers were ac- 
counted for. 

Although the broad bosom of the raging Mississippi 
offered a full sweep for the destructive powers of the tor- 
nado, it is a most remarkable thing that but an infinites- 
imal loss of life occurred in this portion of the storm-rav- 
aged district, and only a few cases in which any injury 
was sustained by those whose occupation demands their 
presence on the river front. While the damage to the 
shipping in the harbor was something tremendous, it was 
regarded by river men as almost miraculous that the loss 
of life and limb is so inconsequential, especially in view of 
the accompanying destruction to property along the wharf. 

While the storm was at its full height the air was laden 
with ponderous beams, iron rods, girders, planks and 
wreckage of every conceivable description, blown from 
the four quarters of the compass, and river craft of every 
class were crashing with destructive force against each 
other and grinding -themselves into fragments, but few 
lives were claimed by the elements, and many reported 
dead turned up safe the next day. 

There were sixteen steamers, five ferryboats, two trans- 
fer boats and six tugs blown from their moorings and 
completely demolished by the storm, besides six others 
which suffered comparatively little damage. The loss to 
shipping interests exceeded $1,000,000, as most of the 
boats have to be entirely rebuilt. Besides this, every 
wharf boat on the river front, except that of the Anchor 
Line, and those used by the city, was blown away and 
sunk in small frao:ments. 



THE GllEAT CYCLONE. 45 

Among the boats which are a total loss are the 
City of Cairo, Arkansas City of the Anchor Line, 
the City of Vicksburg, J. J. Odil, Libbie Conger, 
Dolphin No. 2, which lies bottom up in the middle of 
the river; Bald Eagle, City of Quincy, Pittsburg, Belle 
of Calhoun, Harvester, Charles Merriam and George 
A. Madill. 

The two latter are transfer boats. The steam launch 
Austria, said to be owned by Ellis Wainwright, which 
was moored at the foot of Carr street, was torn from her 
fastenings, lifted into the air and turned bottom up twenty 
feet from the shore. 

THE RIVER A RAGING TORRENT. 

The harbor boat, with Captain Jenks and five men 
aboard; was blown down the stream from Morgan street 
to a point below Lemp's Brewery. In drifting under the 
Eads Bridge her smokestacks w^ent by the board with a 
crash, tearing out the front portion of the upper deck. 
Her upper deck aft was blown out on the trip down. 
David Welsh, a deck hand, who had sought refuge on 
this deck, was caught in the crash and pretty badly in- 
jured. The boat was towed back the next morning and 
anchored opposite the foot of Market street. 

The Anchor Line steamer City of Monroe, which was 
loading at the foot of Pine street, was blown across the 
river and is now lying aground on the rocks on the Illi- 
nois shore opposite Chouteau avenue, minus her stacks, 
derricks, booms and a portion of her upper works. Had 
the storm held off a half hour longer she would have 



46 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

been cleared for New Orleans and escaped the storm. 
Fortunately no one aboard of her was injured. 

The City of Cairo and the Arkansas City, which were 
lying just above the City of Monroe, were also blown out 
into the stream. They floated down to a point below the 
cotton compress plant near Carondelet, where they are 
now lying. There was no one aboard the two boats at 
the time except the Vvatchmen, and they escaped injury, 
although the watchman on the Arkansas City was blown 
into the river opposite Market street. How he ever 
reached the shore in safety he is unable to say. 
^ The City of Quincy, which turned bottom up in the 
river at Carondelet, was anchored at the foot of Franklin 
avenue when the blow struck her. On her way down she 
passed close to the harbor boat, and the watchman who 
was aboard of her clambered onto the harbor boat just 
before the Quincy capsized. 

The City of Providence had a most providential escape 
from total demolition, and the dozen people aboard had 
a close call. The Providence and the City of Vicksburg 
were lying together when the tornado struck them. The 
wind blew through the cabin of the Vicksburg, which was 
closer to the shore, and caught the Providence, tearing 
her loose from her anchorage, blowing her out into the 
stream. The wind demolished the upper decks of the 
boat and ripped out the entire floor of the lower deck, 
scattering it into the river. After being blown to mid- 
stream the wind shifted and drove her back to the wharf, 
where she pounded a big hole in the Vicksburg^s side, an(i 
tore out 100 feet of her own hull. 




RESIDENCE OF AUGUST NASSE, NEAR I^AFAYETTE PARK. 



47 




48 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 49 

Then the wind changed and blew both the Providence 
and Vicksburg across the river, the two boats pounding 
and grinding each other on the trip. The Vicksburg 
caught for a while on the Illinois side, and then was driven 
down below Carondelet, where she was demolished. The 
Providence was driven with great violence into the Illinois 
shore eight times on the trip down, causing great damage, 
and finally landed below the River des Peres on the other 
side. She was towed across to her landing the next day. 
The Vicksburg w^as a total loss, but the Providence was 
not so badly damaged. 

ELEVEN LADIES IN DEADLY PERIL. 

There was a scene of panic aboard the Diamond Jo 
steamer Pittsburg, w^hich was lying just below the bridge, 
when the tornado struck her. There were eleven ladies 
aboard her, and when the wind began to create havoc 
aboard the steamer the terror was something awful. In 
their mad excitement the women attempted to leap over- 
board, and the captain, James P. Poland, and the crew 
had all they could do to prevent them from carrying out 
their mad intentions. In the midst of the excitement the 
wharfboat let go its anchorage, and began moving out 
into the stream with the Pittsburg, which was moored to 
it. Then an indescribable panic seized the passengers, 
and the captain, foreseeing the danger, yelled out for 
someone to cut the hawsers. This was a task fraught 
with the greatest danger to life and limb, as the air was 
dense with flying missiles, but Morris Killeen, the son of 
the superintendent r»f the Diamond Jo line, pluckily 



50 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

seized an ax, and, at the greatest personal risk, suc- 
ceeded in severing the hawsers. The steamer parted 
company with the wharfboat, and was blown over to the 
Illinois side, but fortunately none of those aboard were 
injured. It landed opposite Carondelet, and went 
aground. 

The Grand Republic, which was reported Wednesday 
night to be out in the storm with 500 excursionists 
aboard, returned to port the following morning without 
a scratch, the rumor having fortunately proven untrue. 
The Republic had gone up to Alton to take out an ex- 
cursion, and was out of the direct path of the storm. 

The Louis Ilouck from White river, andtheFerd Her- 
old from Grand Tower, arrived in port on the 28th un- 
scratched by the storm. The Spread Eagle from Alton 
and Grafton got in the same afternoon. The Idlewild 
from Cape Girardeau also tied up here on its regular trip. 
The tug Reliance towed up from Carondelet the wharf- 
boat of the Eagle Packet Company, in a pretty badly 
damaged condition. 

In its path across the Mississippi the tornado did not 
even spare the Eads Bridge, that monument to the engi- 
neering skill of one of the greatest men of the age. 

The whole top abutment of the first pier, as well as the 
big rocks and iron girders of the approach, were picked 
up and thrown upon the roadbed just behind a passenger 
train. In front, two baggage cars were picked up and 
placed across the tracks. The top or upper roadway was 
torn down and thrown upon the train, as well as four 
wagons loaded with merchandise. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE 51 

A sudden stop was made, and although the cars ca- 
reened, the passengers escaped through the wreckage and 
were taken care of. All the way down the approach, 
every pole, signal wire and apron was torn away, and in 
many places piled on the tracks. 

The hydraulic switch works shared the fate of all, 
and the pipes were scattered here and there along the 
approach and Broadway. The escape of the trains was 
remarkable. 

THE DAMAGE IN EAST ST. LOUIS. 

Nearly half of East St. Louis was wrecked. More 
than 100 people were killed and more than two million 
dollars of damage wrought on the east bank of the river. 
The damage was done in a few minutes' time, and how 
any person in the path of the cyclone escaped is a mys- 
tery to all who passed over the devastated section. The 
wind struck the levee just north of the East St. Louis 
elevator, about 5:30. The wharf of the Wiggins Ferry 
was the first to suffer, and it was thrown far up on the 
levee. 

Eye-witnesses on the island graphically describe the 
approach of the destructive storm. Two of these men 
passed through the big cyclone of March 8, 1871, just 
twenty -five years ago, and they say the appearance of the 
clouds, the sky, etc. , was similar to that of the former 
big wind. It struck the shore at exactly the same spot 
and passed up* to town in the same way, never deviating 
more than fifty feet in either direction from start to finish. 
The cloud resembled an inverted funnel, and appeared to 



52 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

have the well-known and generally recognized rotary mo- 
tion. When nearing the shore it seemingly divided and 
spread ont, covering about 200 yards of a swath. 

The scene from the east end of the Eads brid^re resem- 
bled that of a battle-field. The dead and dying were 
removed from the ruins by willing workers, and the bui'n- 
ing mills and warehouses lighted their funeral pyres with 
a distinctness that added horror to the awful scene. Lists 
of the dead were examined carefully to find some trace of 
relatives. At temporary police headquarters a special 
detail of policemen was appointed to keep the anxious 
inquirers out of the station. The oflicers stood about ap- 
palled by the devastation of the storm, and were unable 
to contribute anything to the record of the dead and 
injured. Hundreds of persons, however, told of 'the 
storm king's fury, and thanked God in the most devout 
manner that they had been spared to do so. 

A jury's narrow escape. 

It was about 5:10 o'clock when the storm showed its 
strength in East St. Louis. The center of the tornado 
seemed to be between St. Clair avenue and the viaduct. 
Many dwelling houses ia other parts of the city were de- 
molished, but in this district there were few buildings 
that escaped. A law case was being tried by Judge 
Foulke in the court house. The jury had heard most of 
the testimony and, according to usual custom, were not 
supposed to be allowed to depart except in the 
custody of a bailifi'. When the storm clouds began to 
gather, the foreman of the jury inq^loredthe judge to dis- 




63 





L-^ .--PBi\ 1^^.3*. ..;.,<vr<. ^ ^_^^.>^ •. ^^ 




54 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 55 

charge them. The court house at that time was being shaken 
by the wind. Every moment its destruction was threatened. 
Judge Foulke at length decided to let the jurymen go. Five 
minutes after they departed for their homes that portion of 
the court house in which they had been sitting was torn away. 

Timbers and bricks were piled on each other, and it is 
highly probable that had it not been for the forethought 
of Judge Foulke every juryman would have been killed. 
Judge Foulke himself succeeded in making his way to the 
Relay depot, where he was struck by a timber that was 
being blown through the air and badly injured. In the 
confusion that prevailed his body was allowed to lie on 
the platform for several minutes. People were too in- 
tent on ascertaining the fate of their own loved ones to 
stop to identify anybody, although it might be that 
of one renowned in legal circles and who had spent the 
most of his life sitting in judgment on his fellows. 

At the hotels a panic prevailed. Women ran from 
one room to another, and along the corridors, screaming 
and seeking protection. Men who had faced almost every 
peril were powerless to comfort them. One glance from 
the window told them that the storm w^as one of greater 
force than any they had gone through or even contemplated. 
The strongest of them trembled and there were none who 
pretended they had reasonable hope of escaping alive. 

It was all over in but a few minutes, but it seemed 
hours before the storm forced its way onward out into 
the fields and towards small cities and settlements, many 
of which were subjected to its ungovernable, inexplic- 
able fury and murderous force. 



5G THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



PREDICTED A YEAR IN ADVANCE. 

A prophet is not without honor, save in his own coun- 
try. Hence it was perhaps that the warning issued in 
the summer of 1895 by Rev. Irl R. Hicks, the w^eather 
prophet, was not more generally noted and advantage 
taken of it. On the l7th of May, 1896, he repeated the 
warning. Few noted the fact, and fewer still gave it a 
second thought until the prediction was so dramatically 
and tragically verified. 

Standing in his office and observatory two days after 
the storm this careful student of the planets and their 
storm influences, said : 

''It was manifest for four hours before the storm broke 
loose, that we were in the vortex of a tornado. Every- 
body in this office was apprised of it. The readings of 
the barometer were an absolute guarantee. 

"I stayed right at this w^indow (a south window over- 
looking Twenty-second street) and pointed out to the 
gentleman behind me, Mr. Phillips, our advertising man, 
the exact location where the funnel cloud was forming, in 
which the tornado was organizing its vindictive powers. 

''It was then about 3 o'clock. 

"At the last moment when it was safe to be outdoors 
at all, just about half past four, after pointing out the 
exact quarters where the cyclone was organizing, I took 
the same gentleman out on the front steps with me and 
showed him the exact cloud formation in which the tor- 
nado had gathered its gangrenous forces. 



THE (JllH.vr CVCLoNJl 57 

"It was the last thing I did before ordering the porter 
to close the storm doors of the building.. Having taken 
every observation possible for the safety of my office peo- 
ple and myself, I stepped back to the place already 
chosen in my mind as the safest in case the upper walls 
of the building gave way. I made all my people follow 
my example." 

This place, as pointed out by the reverend gentleman, 
was the northwest corner of the large double parlor ad- 
joining the sliding doors. 

"The reason this place was chosen was that the frame 
of the folding doors would help support the mass of brick 
and debris that might pour down in case of accident. I 
think my action indicated whether I knew or not that the 
storm was tornadic in character and bulging with destruc- 
tiveness. 

"Now, it never has been mentioned that the very mo- 
ment the tornado trunk passed east of a line on Twenty - 
second street there was immediately an illuminated shaft 
reaching up to the zenith, marking the exact location of 
the tornado trunk. It Avas swathed in dust and clouds 
and murky darkness, but it was nevertheless a shaft of 
fire. If it had been night time it would have illuminated 
the sky. That was the center of the tornado. 

BAROMETRICAL READINGS. 

Now for the facts. Our barometer read : 
4 p. m. 29.10. 4:50 p. m. 28.98 5 p. m. 28.95. 
"At 5:07 p. m., about the time of the passage of the 
tornado, when it broke, the barometer read 28.95. 



58 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

*'This was the lowest point touched by our instruments, 
the nearest record immediately prior to the explosion. 

"But to put it still more emphatically. From 10 
o'clock on in the moruino; the barometer's motions were 
phenomenal. Together with the aspect of the heavens 
they were an absolute guarantee that we were in the 
throes of tornadic violence. 

' 'All these facts bearing immediately on the passage 
of the tornado followed out the special warnings that I 
had been issuing from month to mouth for a year. I 
emphasized the fact that there are causes bearing upon 
the subject, that they might be studied and made intelli- 
gible to the people. Now, as to the tornado itself. 

^'The monster was central over Lafayette Park. The 
outer whirls of it were circular, coming from every corner 
of the horizon, and involving more or less the entire city. 
Directly over the park locality there was a chaos of 
motion that is indescribable. On the northern tansjent 
of the circle the motions were easterly. The westerly 
tangent dealt southerly and southeasterly blows, and so 
all around the tirmament with the strand climax of the 
whole over the park. 

'*A11 you have to do is to look at the trees of the park. 
I counted in one corner of the park six trees that had 
fallen in as many different directions. AVhere they would 
not give way to a whirl they were stripped up. Tornado 
funnel clouds have a rebounding force, that accumulates 
as it passes along. Here it dips down, losing some of its 
force, and that accounts for some of the lulls in the track 
of the disaster, only to pick itself up again at some dis- 




&9 




60 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 61 

tant point for a renewed onslaught. The entire track of the 
tornado is marked by these boundingand rebounding spells, 
and the consequent greater or lesser havoc is created. 

"There is no use saying that this tornado was worse 
than any other. The difference lies only in what came in 
its way. All tornadoes are alike. Had this cyclone swept 
a prairie region with a village here and there, fields of 
budding crops, forests and the like, we would not have 
considered it much of a disturber. But it struck a big 
city with a vast expanse of resistive material. Hence the 
awful destruction." 

THE TEXT OF TilE FORECAST. 

In his Almanac for '96 E,ev. Mr. Hicks made the fol- 
lowing forecast for May: ''Saturn, earth and sun will 
be on a line with each other on May 5, or in other words, 
the earth will pass between Saturn and the sun on that 
date, and, in astronomical terms, Saturn will be in oppo- 
sition. The 4th is the central day of the Vulcan storm 
period, as showil in diagram on next page, with moon 
nearing the equator from the south declination. The 
Venus period is also shown in the storm diagram to be 
nearing the center on the 13th. Moon reaches both the 
apogee and the equator on the 7th, as indicated by the 
letter A in both diagrams. 

"All things considered, a storm period of considerable 
force will run from about the 2d to the 7th. A brief high 
barometer and cooler weather will come in the track of the 
storms, but a change will quickly follow as we enter the 
reactionary period to run from about 9th to 12th. 



62 THE GKEAT CYCLONE. 

*'This will be near the center of the Venus equinox and 
at new moon. The opposition of the planet Uranus also 
occurs on the 12th. It will be prudent to watch all storm 
approaches from about 10th to 13th, as dangerous storms, 
with tornadoes possible, are very probable at this time. 

*^ Another Vulcan period is central on the 16th, cov^er- 
ing the 14th to 18th, wdth Venus and Mercury both bear- 
ing upon it, and each near the center of its period. A- 
series of very heavy storms, with enormous rain falls, 
hail and thunder, will occur for days in succession at this 
time. The moon's first quarter falling on the 20th, within 
a few hours of the equator at C. , and upon the central 
day of Mercury's equinox, the disturbances are apt to be 
continued, in a great measure, into the reactionary dis- 
turbance, running to the end of Mercury's period and the 
moon's perigree on the 26th, the stars on the 21st, 22d 
and 23d indicating central days of a specially threatening, 
reactionary period. Remembering that the Venus period 
is characterized by extremes of hot and cold, it will be 
prudent to anticipate very low temperatures after all gen- 
eral storms, with danger of frosts in northerly directions, 
until after the full moon on the 26th. 

"The last storm period is central on the 27th, covering 
26th to 30th. At this time the moon will be at the 
southern extreme of her declination, passing to the front 
of the earth to reach her last quarter early in June. 
Watch the storm clouds durino; all the active disturbances 
in May, as the probabilities are great for many dangerous 
storms. The storms at this season usually come in 
cycles, or periods of twelve and twenty -four hours, for a 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 63 

number of days in succession. The indications are good 
for such results during this month, and that many storms 
with heavy Venus downpours of rain and hail will result 
from about new moon to the end of the month seems 
most probable." 

* 'I have already noted," said Eev. Mr. Hicks, com- 
menting on his predictions and their fulfillment, ^'that 
the barometer's motions were phenomenal all day. The 
sky was decked in mackerel clouds, the infallible precur- 
sors of a cyclone. At 3 o'clock in the afternoon there 
was no longer any question as to whether it would break 
loose over this city or pass over us. The certainty was 
absolute that we were 'in for it, ' to use a vulgair term. 

HOW LOSS COULD HAVE BEEN LESSENED. 

*'At 3 o'clock on the fatal and fated day telephone 
messages could have been sent to every fire engine-house 
in the city. These messages, to the eflPect that a tornado 
was coming, could have been authoritatively supported by 
statements from the signal service office. The ringing of 
the fire bells could have been ordered. 

"The crew of the engine houses could have been in- 
structed to tell the people. 

*'The curious and apprehensive would have flocked to 
them. 

"They would have been apprised of the coming of the 
tornado, and even roughly counseled as to what to do. 

*'The comparatively small loss of life and the stories 
of miraculous rescues illustrate better than anything else 
that many of the people knew what was wise to do under 



64 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the existing conditions. Even the panic of the sudden 
and unforseen that ensued did not stop many from choos- 
ing the proper method for protection. 

"Like the proverbial spread of bad news with seven - 
mile boots, the w^arning would have been carried in less 
than an hour all over the city. To be conservative, it 
would have reached the larger part of it, for the vortex 
was central. 

"The result would have been that people in many 
cases would have fastened up their houses securely and 
gone to the cellars for safety. 

"The large manufacturing concerns could have been 
notified by telephone of the impending disaster, that they 
might have dismissed their employes and shut up their 
plants. 

' ' The business population would have reached home 
quickly and in safety. 

"Men could have been with their families to succor 
and support them in their fright, and hours, nay days, as 
facts have proven, of anxiety and suspense could have 
been spared the separated members of a household. 

" The transportation companies and the street railways 
could have put under shelter much of their rolling stock 
which became playthings of the storm. Animals could 
have been driven to a place of safety, the boats of the 
harbor could have sought refuge further up or down the 
river, for captains ai'e not ignorant of a tornado's course. 
Altogether, though destruction was inevitable,- it could 
hav^e been minimized by proper precautions, instead of 
breaking in over a careless, happy-go-lucky people, that 




.^i^ HA 



TV ||t; 




65 




66 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 67 

set much store in the old, cherished idea that St. Louis 
had always escaped when other points were down. 

"But, as Schiller says: ' An eternal compact cannot 
be made with fate!' " 

DEATH IN THE WIND. 

St. Louis might also have been alarmed at the fearful 
record of death and disaster from cyclones during May. 
Prior to the culminating horror at the great Western me- 
tropolis — equal in magnitude to all that preceded it — the 
following was the ghastly record of the cruel and heart- 
less wind for the month : 

DATE. PLACE. KILLED. INJURED. 

May 4— Fail-mount, W. V 2 3 

May 12— Elkhorn, Neb 1 

May 12 — Lincoln, Neb . . 5 

May 12— Sterling, Kan. 3 

May 13— Marshall, Okla 1 

May 15— Sherman, Tex 85 140 

May 15— Justin, Tex 1 19 

May 15— Gribbe Springs, Tex 4 15 

May 15— Howe, Tex. /. 8 9 

May 15— Farmington, Tex 4 3 

May 15— Carpenter Bluff, Tex 6 

May 15 — Newton, Kan 1 2 

May 16— Reading, Pa 1 2 

May 17— Elva, Ky 5 2 

May IT — Sympsonia, Ky 2 

May 1 7— Seneca, Kan 8 8 

May 17— Sabetha, Kan 5 9 

May 17— Morrill, Kan 4 

May 17— Frankfort, Kan 8 

May 17 — Onedia, Kan 6 

May 17— Reserve, Kan 5 21 

May 18 — Lamoni, lo. .• 4 

May 19— Falls City, Neb 4 12 

May 20— Eldon, Mo 5 



68 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

DATE. PLACE. KILLED. INJURED. 

May 20— Versailles, Mo 1 

May 21 — Lyon County, Kan 2 

May 25— Polk County, lo 11 6 

May 25 — Jasper County, lo 12 12 

May 25 — Manchester, lo 2 

May 25— Monroe, 111 2 1 

May 25— North McGregor, lo 13 17 

May 25 -Elgin and Mount Morris, 111 2 7 

May 25 — La Cygne, Kan 4 

May 25 — Groveland, Oakwood and other 

points in Michigan 39 110 

May 26— Cairo, 111 11 

Totals 230 437 



CYCLONES IN HISTORY. 

The great St. Louis cyclone, while not absolutely the 
worst on record in the matter of death and destruction which 
is scattered around, stands among the very worst. Before 
describing the scenes of desolation and counting the dead 
and wounded, it is of mournful interest to look into his- 
tory and briefly tabulate some of the storms which have 
smitten different countries and communities. 

London, because of its great age and extent, has been 
hit often. A hurricane's assault upon it as far back as 
944 is recorded, which destroyed 1,500 houses, but the 
loss of life as given by the different chroniclers varies 
widely, ranging from 1,000 to 6,000. This is the earli- 
est authenticated account of a calamity of this sort in 
London. The town was struck again in 1091, and 500 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 69 

houses were knocked down this time, and from 200 to 
400 persons were killed. November 26, 1703, several thou- 
sand persons were drowned in floods along the Thames, in 
London, which was preceded and accompanied by a hur- 
ricane that destroyed property in that town valued at 
$10,000,000. This particular tempest was called the 
"great storm," and figured as a time mark for half a cen- 
tury 01 over in "locating'^ dates of births, marriages and 
other events in the lives of people of England, for it ex- 
tended throughout most of the country. It did, in this re- 
spect, the same sort of duty that the ' 'big wind" in Ireland 
did a century and a quarter later. October 28, 1838; July 
11, 1874; April 11, 1878, and December 12, 1883, brought 
storms to London which destroyed from twenty to thirty 
lives in each case, and from $1,000,000 to $3,000,000 
property. 

Havana had a storm on October 25, 1768, which killed 
1000 persons and destroyed 4048 houses. December 12, 
1822, Dublin and its vicinity lost from forty to fifty lives 
and $1,000,000 of property. Dublin was struck again 
on the night of Janury 6 and the morning of January 7, 
1839, by a hurricane which was felt throughout the greater 
part of Ireland and on the west coast of England. Sev- 
eral other large towns in Ireland besides Dublin were 
attacked, including Limerick, Galway and Athlone, and 
in Liverpool the destruction was also great. Thirty per- 
sons were killed by falling buildings or flying missiles in 
that city, and 100 were drowned in the storms. In the 
four Irish cities named the devastation was greater, the 
loss of life in Dublin alone being put at 100, and in prop- 
erty at $3,000,000. 



70. THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

A LANDMARK IN IRISH RECORDS. 

This is the "big wind" referred to in a preceding par- 
agraph. It forms as important a ''landmark" in the 
social history of Ireland as Magna Charta or the Revolu- 
tion of 1688 does in the political history of England, or 
as the Declaration of Independence or the fall of Fort 
Sumter does in that of the United States. It is a great 
date line in the lives of many of the Irish people^ who 
are 50 years of age or upward. When they say they 
were born in the year of the "big wind," or one, two or 
any other number of years before or after that time, they 
have, they think, given their age with sufficient exactness 
for practical purposes, and in many cases this is as near 
as they can get at their exact age. 

Lisbon had a gale December 13, 1864, which was 
memorable in the records of that city of manifold and 
miscellaneous physical affiictions, destroying 100 lives 
and $2,000,000 property. In Maceo, Hong Kong and 
other cities in India on Septembr 22, 1874, a typhoon 
killed 10,000 people and wrecked between 40,000 and 
60,000 houses. Buda-Pesth had a storm June 26, 1875, 
which destroyed 200 lives. In Haifong and other Chi- 
nese cities 300,000 persons perished in a typhoon Octobei* 
8, 1881. At Colon, Panama, and in its harbor 100 lives 
were lost December 2, 1885, in a gale. Madrid lost 
ninety lives in a storm May 12, 1886. In Dacca, India, 
April 7, 1888, 100 persons were killed in a gale. Mau- 
ritius, in tlie Indian Ocean, on April 29, 1892, had a 
hurricane which killed 150 persons. 




71 




72 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 73 

STORMS IN OUR OWN LAND. 

In the United States, Louisville was the first important 
town visited by a destructive storm. August 27, 1854, it 
had twenty-five persons killed and $1,000,000 property 
destroyed in a cyclone. Indianola, Tex. , was nearly wiped 
off the face of the earth September 15, 1875, losing 126 
lives and $1,000,000 of property. McAlester, I. T., 
nearly equaled that record May 10, 1882, the destruction 
being 125 lives and $500,000 of property. The year 
1882 had a series of cyclones which were not matched in 
number and destructiveness until 1896. In one of these 
the town of Grinnell, lo. , was destroyed, with a loss of 
$1,000,000 in property and 100 lives. Just seven days 
later Emmettsburg, lo., was blotted off the map, with a 
loss approximately equal to that at Grinnell. Mount 
Vernon, 111., on February 18, 1888, was almost destroyed, 
thirty-nine persons being killed and 125 injured, many 
of them fatally. Pittsburg lost fifty-three lives in a tor- 
nado January 9, 1889. 

Now comes the most destructive storm which ever vis- 
ited a city on the Atlantic seaboard in the United States. 
This was the great blizzard of March 11 and 12, 1888, 
which New York City felt in its fiercest form. For more 
than a day business in that city was entirely suspended, 
and communication between it and tlie rest of the country 
was cut off as effectually as it was between St. Louis and 
the outside world daring the tempest of AVednesday night 
of this week. New York for about twenty -four hours 
got its news from Philadelphia by way of London. 
About 400 lives were lost in New York and the other 



74 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

towns afflicted and in wrecks on the ocean in the vicinity, 
which the gale caused, while the property loss was esti- 
mated at $3, 000, 000, but New York City's share of this 
destruction was only about thirty lives and $1,000,000 
property. Eoscoe Conkling, who refused to be quaran- 
tined down town by this storm, and who walked from his 
office to his hotel through the mountainous snow drifts, 
travel by car, coach, vehicle of any sort or on horseback 
being suspended and impossible, died a iew days later 
from the effects of his fatigue and exposure. 

Louisville now figures a second time in a tornado, and 
sustained more damage than any other town in the United 
States from a wind storm, except St. Louis, in the hurri- 
cane of May 27, 1896. This was on March 27, 1890. 
Louisville's loss of life was placed at 125 at the time, and 
its property loss at $2,500,000. Like the St. Louis 
storm, the Louisville gale cut a broad path through the 
city, its width, in the course of greatest destructiveness, 
being fully 1,000 feet. The greatest storms in the 
United States since that at Louisville were those on the 
South Atlantic coast on August 28, 1893, which commit- 
ted havoc in Charleston and Savannah, and with the ship- 
ping on the ocean in their vicinity, the aggregate loss of 
life being about 1,000, and in the Gulf of Mexico, on the 
coast of Louisiana, on October 2, in that year, in which 
2,000 lives were lost. 

Several series of storms occurring in the past twenty 
years are omitted here because the records give the losses 
by counties and not by towns. The most notable and 
destructive were those which visited Missouri, Illinois, 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 75 

Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Georgia, the two Caro- 
linas and Virginia, on February 9, 1884, in which the 
aggregate loss was 800 lives and 10, 000 houses. In the 
region covered there were sixty different tornadoes on 
that day. The loss of life in the aggregate was greater 
on that day than was ever known before or since in that 
length of time in wind storms in the United States. The 
destruction during the last two weeks of May, however, 
beginnino; with the cyclones in Sherman and other points 
in the Southwest and ending with those in St. Louis and 
vicinity, and including the waterspouts and other me- 
teorological disturbances, broke all records in this country 
for any equal period. 



VICTIMS OF THE CYCLONE. 

An account of the evil wrought by the storm must 
read like the annals of a great battle or series of battle's. 
We have seen how the storm was predicted, how the 
clouds gathered in formidable and threatening array, and 
how they advanced upon a city which considered itself 
practically safe. We must now note what the cyclone or 
tornado did in the way of killing and maiming and what 
astounding damage it wrought to property. Thousands 
followed the cyclone's path the following day, picking 
their way among the wreckage, and pausing to gaze hor- 
ror-stricken at some of the scenes that met their gaze. 
There was little said by the spectators. Their silence 



76 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

was more eloquent than any words could have been. 
Strong men shivered with horror, and if there were any 
unmoved, their callousness was well hidden. 

It was a stricken city, or rather section of a city, that 
they saw. The dead were being removed from beneath 
piles of debris; willing workers were clearing away wreck- 
age, hoping against hope that those who were known to 
be lying below had miraculously escaped certain death. 
Shade trees snapped, windows broken, chimneys pros- 
trated, sections of tin roof ripped, cornices shattered, 
weak walls cracked — such things could be seen almost 
anywhere from the water works to Carondelet. But apart 
from these general evidences, there was the path of a 
storm cloud covering the city at its widest part, with a 
course from southwest to northeast. The path was as 
distinct as the boundaries of blocks. Beside the damage 
wrought within this path, the injuries sustained by the 
city at large were insignificant. 

SURVEYING THE WRECK. 

It was no easy task to follow the course of the storm. 
Where the wind had rushed the preceding day at a speed 
seldom attained by the fleetest locomotive, the foot pas- 
senger followed at a snail's pace. He had to walk, for 
no vehicle could be driven through the mass of ruins. 
Progress was from side to side by a zigzag route. This 
tracing of the course of the storm cloud began in the 
southwestern part of the city at Shaw's Garden. It ended 
at the Eads bridge. The distance across the city from 
west to east, at the widest part, is six miles. As the 




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THE GREAT CYCLONE. 79 

storm traveled from southwest to northeast, the length of 
its path within the city was eight miles. 

West of Shaw's Garden the storm cloud gathered. It 
did little damage immediately west, but on the north it 
unroofed buildings at Forest Park Heights, and on the 
south it caused the collapse of two large buildings at the 
Poorhouse, and did miscellaneous damage, altogether 
amounting to perhaps $50,000. Singularly enough, the 
Insane Asylum and the Female Hospital, standing on the 
same elevation as the Poorhouse, escaped anything seri- 
ous. Shaw's Garden, in the wide Valley between Forest 
Park Heights on the north and the group of city institu- 
tions on the ridge to the south, showed dismantlement. 
One of the largest conservatories was crushed in. Other 
buildings were injured. The trees and shrubbery were 
torn and scourged. 

In its beginning the storm cloud, as we have already 
seen, started from several points. It showed its power 
at the localities high and low, mentioned, but in the ter- 
ritory between it left weaker buildings unharmed. And 
thus it moved along in strips up the easy grade toward 
Grand avenue, half a mile eastward. It was not difficult 
to trace the southwest section of the cloud from the Poor- 
house hill across Tower Grove Park and to the Old 
People's Memorial Home, on Grand avenue, by prostrated 
trees, overturned fences and some injuries to houses. 
There was a like strip from Shaw's Garden eastward to- 
ward the Compton Hill reservoir on Grand avenue. A 
third division of the storm cloud, perhaps the one which 
unroofed buildings at Forest Park Heights, moved east- 



80 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

ward on the north side of Shaw's Garden and tore down 
the steel frame work of two of the group of buiklings be- 
ing constructed for the Liggett &> Myers tobacco factory. 
This steel frame work was four stories high. It towered 
above the unfinished brick walls three stories. Three big 
buildings on an east and west line stood at that stage of 
construction. 

The section of the storm cloud passing north of Shaw's 
Garden tore down the three uncovered stories of steel 
beams and supports as if they had been so much of cob 
houses. This it did with the first and third of the build- 
ings, leaving the middle building unharmed. It was 
under the mass of structural steel at the third building 
that eight lives were crushed out. A little beyond the 
Liggett & Myers plant the cloud lifted ten heavy freight 
cars from the St. Louis and San Francisco track and laid 
them on their sides. From that point this third section 
of the cloud made its way eastward. 

On Grand avenue, between Lafayette on the north and 
Shenandoah on the south, the three sections converged 
and united their forces. Between the paths traveled by 
the sections of the cloud to the immediate vicinity of the 
reservoir stretches of the city sustained no loss whatever. 
Along the three paths were continuous trails. But after 
crossing to the east side there was but one path, wide and 
extensive. 

A SUBURB DESOLATED. 

Compton Heights is the name this suburb adjoining 
the reservoir bears. It is one of the highest points in St. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 81 

Louis, having been chosen for that reason as the water 
distributing location to the southern half of the city. A 
portion of the heights has been laid off in accordance 
with advanced landscape gardening ideas, with curving 
roadways and building sites of irregular form. Compton 
Heights, ten blocks from north to south and six to eight 
blocks wide, has 300 residences which cost from $5,000 
to $25,000. Not one of them escaped some injury and 
the most of them show ugly gaps in their walls, demol- 
ished gables and missing sections of roofs. These are 
houses of recent construction, strongly made and well 
finished. Through the rents which the storm cloud made 
the torrents of rain poured in and drenched the interiors. 
The outward desolation of Compton Heights revealed but 
a part of the loss sustained. Richly upholstered furni- 
ture, books, tapestries and velvet carpets were scattered 
on the lawns to catch the drying sun and wind. There 
were streets on Compton Heights which were impassable 
until choppers went through them cutting and rolling out 
of the way the prostrate trees. Trees as large as a man's 
body were torn up by the roots and when the roots came 
up they broke and displaced the squares of the granitoid 
pavement. 

The storm cloud passed from Compton Heights, bear- 
ing a little to the north of east. It struck a different 
class of houses and a different neighborhood. Moving 
up and lapping over to the north of Lafayette avenue, 
while it angled away from Shenandoah on the south, the 
cloud was a full half mile wide on Oregon avenue. From 
Oregon eastward to Jefferson avenue is four long blocks, 



82 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

dipping gently to Ohio and then rising again to Jeffer- 
son. In the forty blocks lying within these boundaries 
the rule is lots of twenty-five feet and substantial houses 
of from 13,000 to $6,000 cost. The territory is closely 
built. It contains over 500 houses. Fully 200 of them 
were left uninhabitable. 

Three -story houses were reduced to two stories, and 
there w^as nothing but the blue vault of heaven above 
those who went to bed upstairs. Sidewalls from roof to 
foundation were cut out. Sometimes it was the west wall 
and sometimes it was the east wall. Bay windows were 
suddenly enlarged to treble the size planned by the archi- 
tect. Roofs were gone. In thirty or forty cases the whole 
house was a heap of brick and timber. Near the corner 
of Russell and California avenues the storm took the 
roof off one house and moved the roof of the next house 
over upon the first house. It was a sad misfit, however, 
Talk about the architecturally weak being the sufferers! 
On California avenue north of Lafayette is an almost new 
public school building. The storm cloud took out a part 
of the sixteen -inch wall on the north side. There are 
livery stables, drug stores, groceries and markets in this 
district between Oregon on the west and Jeffereson on 
the east. They all suffered as did the residences. The 
damage was universal. 




83 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 85 



IN AN OLDER SECTION. 

At Jefferson avenue the storm cloud struck the Lafay- 
ette park district. Its northern line edged over Park 
avenue. Its southern limit was the South Side race track. 
The path widened into three-quarters of a mile. The storm 
cloud came to one of the most complete of the smaller 
parks in the United States. It found the finished work 
of thirty years of municipal care. Lapping over the 
park two blocks to the northward and four blocks to the 
southward, the cloud made its deepest impress upon the 
city. 

People who had wondered what would happen if a tor- 
nado should strike a great city, wondered no more after 
inspecting the stricken Lafayette park district. Thomas 
H. Benton in bronze stood on his pedestal, pointing to 
the west in the pose suggested by his words. 

* 'There is the east, there is India." Around him was 
the park forestry of a third of a century's growth, elms, 
maples, poplars and fir trees. Benton's statue remained 
in place, but all around him lay trees prostrate, while 
those not torn up by the roots stand gaunt, twigless and 
leafless. The massive iron fence was flat on the ground. 
People walked in and out where they will. The gates 
were useless. 

St. Louis' beauty spot is gone. Lafayette park, the 
queen of all the city's outing places, had been suddenly 
transformed into a vision of ugliness, whose imperfections 
now were accenuated * by the recollection of its former 



S6 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

comeliness. Lafayette park was a favorite with St. 
Louisans. Its destruction caused many a child to lose its 
cherished playground. Nurses will for months be at a 
loss to know where to take their charges for a breath of 
fresh air and many of their elders will sigh for the cool 
nooks and foliage for which this retreat was famous. Sit- 
uated in the direct path of the storm center, nothing es- 
caped the fury of the cyclone except the statues. The 
granite columns were proof even against a tornado and 
stood the day after the storm like grim sentinels guarding 
vandals from adding spoliation to devastation. 

Thousands of persons visited the park and commiser- 
ated with each other on the ruin of what had been justly 
called the prettiest spot in St. Louis. They cut canes 
from the branches of the trees and carried away parts of 
the benches as mementoes of the storm. They saw the 
bark torn from the body of huge oaks; saplings were torn 
up by the roots, and for the first time they gained an ad- 
equate idea of the force of a quantity of compressed air 
driven by a power no one has analyzed. Part of the iron 
fence surrounding the lake was blown into the water. All 
the houses except that occupied by the caretaker of the 
park were destroyed. That building was damaged badly. 
The band stands were blown away and parts of them 
were found hundreds of yards away. Every flower in 
the park was destroyed. Some of the rose bushes were 
uprooted, while the smaller varieties were crushed under 
branches and flying debris. At every entrance of the park 
there were trees lying across each other. The only mo- 
tive of the cyclone seemed to have been to typify fantastic 



THE (JREAT CYCLONE. 87 

anarchy. Disorder prevailed, for In the madness of this 
storm there was no method. The only living things in 
all the park, except the sightseers, were the birds on the 
pond. Even they swam about in an aimless, bewildered 
sort of fashion. 

MOURNING THE RUIN OF THE PARK. 

It is a noteworthy fact that indescribable as was the 
destruction of homes, and heartrending as this harbinger 
of poverty was, the ruins of Lafayette Park excited the 
strongest and most universal expressions of sorrow. The 
residents of the South End in particular were distressed 
at its misfortune. 

To them the park was a thing of beauty and a joy for- 
ever, and more. It was the scene of many tender mem- 
ories. Were it not for the storm, many of them would 
hav^e been rowing in the park pond to-day. Others — 
staid citizens and tired youths — would have been reading 
papers and books beneath its leafy bowers. The children 
would have been romping over its pretty lawns and the 
mothers and daughters would have been admirino; the 
exquisite beauty of the flowers. 

The young folks, as they picked their way through the 
network of tangled ti'ees, recalled the many pleasant 
hours they passed there. They skated on the pond in 
winter, they boated there in summer, and when the snow 
was hard and glassy they coasted down the flagpole hill. 
As children they had innocent flirtations under the shade 
trees, and when they became older and more formal they 
visited the park on Thursdays in summer and listened to 



88 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the music of the band, gossiping between the numbers. 
This is why the South Enders mourn the havoc played 
in the park almost as much as they grieved over their 
own desolation. 

To none did this seem sadder than to Sir Charles 
Gibson. When he looked out from the wreck of his 
palatial home and cast his eyes over the once beautiful 
park, the tears coursed down the old man's cheeks. 

It was not for his home that he cared most; not for the 
dollars that the storm's fury had stolen from him; not for 
the litter and the debris that littered the beautiful avenue. 
His own flesh and blood were safe — his dear ones — and 
next to them his heart went out to the poor, distorted 
trees which for forty years he had seen growing from tiny 
little shoots, like little babies, into the great massive 
trunks fit to grace the primeval forest. 

This was desolation no gold could replace. This was 
a wound to him no time could heal. He is an old man 
now, and as he stood there contemplating the sad scene it 
all came to him. He could never again see that picture 
that had so often made him young and carried him back 
to the days when his blood was coursing strongly in his 
veins and life was roseate with the flush of manhood's 
prime. 

"Dick," he said to his son-in-law, Richard Perry, who 
stood beside him, "it took forty years to grow^ those 
trees, and I shall never see their like again. The house 
I can repair, but my trees are gone forever." 

The Lafayette Park churches, which had been gay 
with summer costumes and bright faces, will not echo to 




89 




i 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 91 

hymns of praise for many days to come. The crumbling 
walls did not invite one to prayer the day after the storm, 
but even if they were -intact, they would have few wor- 
shipers. The reason was that many families whose names 
were on the membership rolls were bereft of homes, and 
all too disconsolate to seek comfort by their usual de- 
votions. 

HOMES AND CHURCHES DESTROYED. 

Fronting on the four sides of Lafayette Park were the 
five stone -front mansions, which were the pride of the 
city fifteen years ago, before the West End movement 
set in. Opening out from the broad avenues around the 
park were Benton, Nicholson and other ^' places," with 
the fringes of beautiful homes. Four stone churches of 
recent and imposing architecture are in this Lafayette 
Park district. On the edge was the monster and model 
power house of the Scullin street car system. Surely 
this was a district in which the storm cloud might make 
its work costly, and it did. The ruin wrought in the 
park was only typical of that around it. Shattered and 
torn by the whole day's shelling from a hundred guns, 
this district could not present a worse spectacle. The 
costly power house was a heap of ruins, with no salvage 
except in the form of some of the heaviest parts of the 
machinery. The churches were unroofed, their walls 
partly demolished. As for the mansions, from $8,000 
to $20,000 structures, the idea of reckless cannonading 
can only give a conception of the infinite variety of dam- 
ages. 



92 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

The storm cloud passed out of the Lafayette Park dis- 
trict. Its north line reached Chouteau avenue, while the 
southern line of its path drew in toward Geyer. Before 
the cloud was a district of small manufacturing concerns, 
of many flats and of tenements, with the old rambling 
City Hospital, a patchwork by many builders, in the 
midst. Portions of the hospital stand shattered and tot- 
tering. Other portions were down flat. The 450 patients 
had to be cared for in temporary quarters. Perhaps 
more people live within this district than in any other of 
like size in the city. Eastward from Second Carondelet 
on the west, with Papin street north and Geyer avenue 
and Soulard street south, the population is dense. That 
the dead was not 1,000 and the wounded 10,000 is the 
mystery after one has threaded this part of the storm 
cloud's path. * 'Where is the worst?" one was asked. 
That was hard to tell, but certainly there was nothing 
worse than what could be witnessed from Lafayette Park 
northeast to Broadway, a long mile. It was desolation, ruin 
to those who had little. There were streets which were not 
traversed because of the debris. There were a thousand 
roofs gone, a hundred thousand windows smashed, whole 
rows flattened to the ground, street cars overturned and 
wrecked. Some people moved from this district at once. 
Most of the tenants stayed to pass the night in practical 
'^camping out." The problem of house hunting was too 
much for them the first day after the tornado. 

Up and down Broadway, from Chouteau avenue for a 
quarter of a mile each way, the storm wrecked the stores. 
Here a new business spirit had taken root within the past 






THE GREAT CYCLONE. 93 

two or three years. The retail merchants of South Broad- 
way were full of hope for that section of the city. The tor- 
nado struck them hard, very hard. It tore off roofs and 
it ruined stocks of goods. 

IN OLD ST. LOUIS PROPER. 

From Broadway to the river, through the oldest part 
of St. Louis, a ad thence up the river to the Eads Bridge, 
is a chapter of itself. It is a long record of wrecks of 
buildings that were entitled to historical tablets, build- 
ings in Avhich business was done by men who have been 
dead so long their names have passed into commercial 
oblivion. Crowds surged up and down the Levee all day. 
There was a fascination in the masonry leveled from the 
great bridge. There was greater interest in the big river 
.boats driven across the river and left careened on the 
Illinois bank. And then, too, from this side there was 
a vista of unroofed buildings and jagged walls the whole 
length of Bloody Island. 

Two facts were made most impressive by a trip over 
the whole path of the tornado. One was the widespread 
havoc wrought with the wires — telegraphic, telephone 
and trolley. The other was the deluge of dirty water 
which the storm cloud brought with it. Other parts of 
the city came out bright and fresh after the hard rain. 
In the path of the tornado proper every building shows 
the spattered, dingy effect of this muddy water, which 
must have been sucked up somewhere and then turned 
loose by the whirling cloud. 



94 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

THE CITY HOSPITAL WRECKED. 

The St. Louis city hospital was over crowded when the 
storm struck and demolished it and it was first thought 
that at least 200 of the patients under treatment were 
killed. 

The damage to the hospital was appalling. Division 
M was completely demolished. The west end of divis- 
ion No. 9 was blown out. Division No. 10 was com- 
pletely destroyed. The southeast corner of the west 
wing was torn out. The new erysipelas ward, under con- 
struction, was razed to the ground. The dead house and 
the crematory were completely destroyed. Division 6 
was wrecked. The third story of the east wing at the 
southeast corner of the building was blown in. The am- 
phitheater was badly damaged as was also the surgical 
ward. 

In the darkness which followed the storm the hospital 
presented a desolate appearance. The rain dripped 
through the wrecked portions and every few moments a 
crash of falling plastering caused the inmates of the in- 
stitution to shudder with fear and tremble with fright. 
The dining room had been destroyed and no one received 
much to eat. A hasty lunch was prepared, everyone 
being glad to get a bite of cold food. 

To all appearances the hos])ital lay in the very path of 
the storm center, and the havoc it created at that point is 
beyond conception. The entire structure was unroofed; 
the south wall was blown out and when the acute surgical 
ward followed, the thirteen occupants were buried under 
a mass of ruins. Only one, James Dunn, was killed out- 



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95 




96 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 97 

right. Gf the other patients, over 100 were more or less 
severely wounded, and were dug out as soon as possible 
by Dr. Sutter and a corps of physicians. 

The top story of the west wing, the whole south side 
of the west wing, the top story of the south wing and a 
big portion of the southeast corner of the east wing were 
blown entirely out. Besides this the stables, ice house, 
dead house and other adjuncts to the hospital were en- 
tirely demolished. 

All the windows in the entire structure were blown 
out, in many cases the glass and debris falling on the pa- 
tients, bruising and cutting them to a considerable extent. 
The rain poured in from the top and sides of the ruined 
structure, and the fright and consternation of the inmates 
of the institution can not be overdrawn, the employes 
state. 

While making the rounds about 9 o'clock, Dr. Sutter 
found that a patient, Francisco Eodriguez, a servant for- 
merly in the employ of the Mexican Consul here, had died 
apparently from fright. She had come to the institution 
several days ago to be treated for a minor complaint, and 
Dr. Sutter is confident that fright alone was responsible 
for her death. The expression on the dead woman's face, 
as Dr. Sutter removed the sheet which covered it, was 
something awful to look upon. 

REMOVING THE SUFFERERS. 

As quickly as possible the patients were removed from 
the upper stories of the hospital and deposited on cots in 
the two lower stories. Even these floors were uncomfort- 



98 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

able to an extreme, in many places the water soaking 
through the upper floors and falling below in streams. 
At one time fears were entertained that the top part of 
the building might become watersoaked and cave in upon 
the patients below. Dr. Sutter said he was positive that 
the place was unsafe, and he issued orders that the in- 
mates be removed from it as soon as possible. The 
worst of the injured were removed at once to the House of 
the Good Shepherd, at Seventeenth and Chestnut streets, 
and to the Alexian Brothers' Hospital, both of which in- 
stitutions threw open their doors when they received the 
news of the hospital's catastrophe. 

It was said at the hospital that the storm struck there 
about supper time. Before any one had time to realize 
what had happened almost the entire structure was in 
ruins. Lights went out immediately, and the place for 
about a half hour was in total darkness, save for the 
flashes of lightning which occasionally lighted up the 
surroundings. After the worst of the storm had passed, 
the employes could see to carry on the rescue work, and 
when night settled down for good the place was lighted 
by means of candles. 

At the time of the storm the institution contained 416 
patients. While the elements were raging at the worst 
many of the inmates became ungovernable, and broke 
away from their attendants and sought refuge in neigh- 
boring houses. It was impossible in the confusion to tell 
how many had left the institution in this way. The pris- 
oners confined at the hospital raised all kinds of commo- 
tion during the storm, and one of them, James E.Wood, 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 99 

escaped. The quarters in which they were confined were 
not damaged, but steps were at once taken to have them 
removed to some point of safety. 

Dr. Sutter considered it a miracle that the inmates at the 
hospital escaped as luckily as they did. One can hardly 
look at what remained of the building and think that but 
two persons were killed outright. 

physicians' heroism. 

Dr. Sutter and a corps of physicians, nurses and volun- 
teers from the neighborhood made things as comfortable 
as possible for the patients injured by the falling debris. 
The kitchens, dining rooms, offices and Dr. Sutters pri- 
vate quarters were all turned into sick wards. When the 
physicians had finished dressing the wounds of the injured 
there were dozens of patients who exhibited bandaged 
heads, lacerated breasts, arms and faces. In several in- 
stances it became necessary to crowd two patients in a 
narrow bed. Invalid men and women, further weakened 
and terrified by the storm and their injuries, called aloud 
for medicine to end their misery, while others cried for 
something to put them to sleep. One man whose elbow 
was fractured leaped from his bed in pain and started to 
run through the hall. He was finally quieted. With the 
assistance of neighbors no one of the 416 hospital patients 
was neglected. At 9:00 o'clock at night the water 
had commenced to drip into the basement and second floor 
of the east wing, where temporary wards had been made. 
Dr. Lutz offered accommodation at the Alexian Brothers' 
Hospital for 150 patients. The offer was accepted by Dr. 



100 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Sutter, who immediately made an effort to remove all the 
patients from the rain-soaked and tottering structure. 

^'It is a terrible way to get rid of an old barn/' re- 
marked Dr. Sutter while resting a moment from his efforts, 
**but now the city will be compelled to erect a new and 
modern hospital. It is astonishing that hundreds were 
not killed. How the patients managed to scramble to 
safety is a miracle to me." 

George Wilson, a patient confined on the second floor 
at the City Hospital, was picked up in his bed by the 
wind and blown into the yard below. He landed on his 
feet and scrambled into the basement. After he had 
recovered from, his fright, he said : 

"I didn't know what had broke loose. I knew some- 
thing awful was happening, and thought may be the end 
of the world had come. There was a roar. The walls 
in our division fell out. The rain rushed in onus. Then 
I felt myself picked up in bed and borne out on the 
ground. I somehow managed to scramble to the base- 
ment, although suffering severely from rheumatism." 

The acute surgical ward, which was leveled with the 
ground, was completed two years ago at a cost of $12,000 
to the city. It was new and elegantly equipped. 

The new erysipelas ward was almost completed. It 
was to have bqen a two -story brick structure at a cost 
of $5000. It was almost totally wrecked. 

Investigation the following day disclosed still further 
damage. The machinery in the engine house was barely 
touched, but a steam pipe broke soon after the storm 
began and caused much excitement. The roof of the 




101 




102 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 103 

boiler house caved in and caused a little damage. The 
carpenter shop was entirely unroofed. The old records 
were stored in the second story, and they are almost all 
lost. The few volumes that have been saved are water 
soaked. When the wall was blown out of Division 9, on 
the third floor, a man was carried with it, and landed 
over in Carroll street, over 500 feet from the hospital. 
He picked himself up and walked back to the building 
as though nothing had happened. The new building for 
the treatment of erysipelas, which was in the course of 
construction, was partly blown down. 

The number of deaths at the hospital from the cyclone 
increased to four within twenty-four hours. Besides the 
man Dunn, who died from injuries received during the 
tornado, there were three deaths during the night. One 
was Jean d'Archimbault, who crazed with fear when the 
partition wall of his division fell near him, jumped up and 
proceeded 30 feet on one sound leg and a freshly ampu- 
tated limb. He was tenderly carried back to his cot when 
discovered, but four hours later he expired from the shock. 

Francisca Rodriguez, an aged ex-servant of Mexican 
Consul Sardaneta, also died of fear. 

Another victim was a woman named Collins, aged 45, 
suffering from inflammatory rheumatism, whose death was 
brought about by frenzied terror at the storm. 

The scene at the hospital during the tornado, with roof, 
walls, partitions and floors collapsing on all sides, was 
indescribably awful. Physicians and nurses, however, 
behaved with calm courage and heroism, but it was long 
before they could control the army of stampeded patients. 



104 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

many with limbs in plaster or bandages, who rushed 
wildly about in search of safety. 

It was a miracle, considering the damage it underwent, 
that a fearful loss of life was averted. In many cases 
the divisions or wards were wiped out, patients' cots and 
furniture being hurled into the grounds. One man, a 
consumptive, was propelled from the fourth story of the 
west wing to the fence on the west side, fully 150 feet. 
He was not injured, but at once ran back into the 
hospital. 

Desolate, surrounded on every side by evidences of the 
tornado's mad fury and itself a dismantled, uninhabited 
ruin, stood the wrecked and deserted Hospital. Its 
fences, its shade trees, its statuary, had been raised to 
the earth. Its grass plats were littered with broken 
slate, brickbats, cornices, telegraph poles and roofing 
material. Its outhouses, almost without exception, were 
demolished. Its wagon shed, stables, ice house, mor- 
tuary, crematory, boiler-room and laundry were no 
more. Its vast western wing was a pitiful wreck, roof- 
less and piled up on every floor, with plastering, rub- 
bish, broken cots, torn blankets and furniture. Its par- 
titions had fallen in, its chimneys were down and in 
almost every division great pools of stagnant water gave 
evidence of the visitation of the fluid as well as of the 
tornadic element. A more heartrending scene cannot be 
pictured in any imagination than this sombre pile which 
two days before contained nearly half a thousand human 
beings and scores of public oflficials. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 105 

HORRORS AT THE POOR HOUSE. 

The destruction at the City Poor House was also enor- 
mous, and the fright of the aged poor was something 
terrible to witness. With the crash of the walls as they 
fell like match boarding before the wind were mingled 
the wild shrieks of unfortunate patients, whose mental 
deficiencies were aggravated by the tumult of the hurri- 
cane. The situation was sufficiently horrible to unman 
the hardiest. The entire roof of the female pauper build- 
ing was torn off and flung hundreds of yards away. The 
front porch of the center building was utterly demolished, 
the large posts being twisted away from the walls. The 
main damage done at the big institution, however, was 
caused by the destruction of the tower which stood upon 
the top of the central building. The tower was blown 
down and crashed entirely through the building down into 
the basement. The weight of the tower and portion of 
the roof was heavy enough to carry with it each of the 
three floors of the building situated beneath where the 
tower stood. 

At the moment the storm struck the tower and de- 
stroyed it Mrs. Ottersen, one of the attendants, was in 
the chapel, which is situated in the basement directly 
beneath the tower. Mrs. Childress, another attendant at 
the institution, was in the act of descending the stairs 
leading from the third story, which were also directly be- 
neath the tower. When the immense structure rocked in 
the wind and the tower was sent crashing through the 
roof, it caught Mrs. Childress and pinioned her to the 
staircase. She was hit by a flying brick and knocked 



106 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

down, which fact saved her life, as had she been able to 
take another step she would have been carried down- 
ward with the debris. When found she was lying 
on the staircase with the lower part of her body hanging 
over the newly created chasm. She was conscious, but 
suffering agony from the frightful gash in her head and 
the heavy timbers and beams which confined her body 
and crushed her chest. She was extricated with much 
difficulty and immediately given all the attention and care r 
possible. At a late hour last night her condition was I 
very serious and it is expected she will die. 

Mrs. Ottersen, who was in the chapel at the time, was 
completely buried beneath the mountain of bricks, mason- , 
ry and timbers, which crashed from above. She pre- 
sented a piteous sight when the army of workmen finally 
located her and started to remove the debris from her J 
body. It was a task of some time and difficulty, as sev- 
eral immense beams had become lodged directly upon her 
and had become fixed against the opposite wall. Her 
legs were pinioned to the ground while her chest was 
crushed flat by a great rafter which almost prevented her 
breathing. Strange to say she also was conscious when 
found. Her condition is more dangerous than that of 
Mrs. Childress, and the physicians do not hold out much 
hope for her recovery. Although no bones were broken, 
so far as could be ascertained, she has been injured inter- 
nally and her body and face were horribly bruised. 

There were eight of the inmates of the Poorhouse who 
received numerous wounds from flying glass^and brick, 
but it is not thought that their injuries are in any way 




lO'/ 




108 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 109 

dangerous. Several of the attendants were cut slightly 
by flying splinters of glass. 

The deadhouse, which had two dead bodies in it, one 
of which had been sent there only a half hour previous, 
was completely demolished by the furious wind. The 
building, which was a weak one, was entirely obliterated, 
and the two dead bodies swept away in the wind. The 
keeper of the dead house and potters field, who sleeps in 
the deadhouse, had. left the building just before the storm 
and had gone up to the main building. He owes his life 
to the fact, as he undoubtedly would have been killed had 
he remained in the shanty. 

PROVIDENTIAL ESCAPES. 

Incredible as it sounds, with 1,300 patients in the build- 
ing, 750 of whom are insane, not a life was lost at the 
Poorhouse during the storm. The insane patients in 
their ward gave the attendents a great deal of trouble 
during the first spell of the fierce wind. They could not 
be controlled and filled the building with their shrieks 
and cries. After the storm had abated a little, they were 
induced to quiet down. The new building for the male 
insane patients, which is the most westerly of all the 
buildings out there, was not damaged in the least by the 
storm. The engine-room suffered from the loss of the 
stacks, which were blown away. Hundreds of windows 
were torn from their casements and flung to the ground, 
[ and shutters were flung in every direction. 

A view of the damaged central building presented a 
desolate spectacle, the diffent floors being open to the 



;[X0 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

sky and dripping with floods of water. The top floor 
was used for the attendants, the next floor under the 
tower was used by Superintendent Overbeck, and the 
second floor by Dr. Meredith. In the basement was the 
chapel. Everything in the rooms mentioned is a com- 
plete loss. The damage to the buildings is estimated at 
at least $15,000. 

In conversation with eyewitnesses of the storm at the 
Poorhouse it was stated that the first touch of the dis- 
astrous wind was felt at 4:50 o'clock. The patients have 
their supper at 4:30 o'clock and get to their floors at 4:50. 
It was just as the patients reached their floors that the 
storm struck the building. The wind came first from the 
southeast, then veering rapidly to the southwest it came 
hustling back again. The tower was torn off with a loud 
report and as it crashed through the roof the whole build- 
ing shook to the foundations. A panic ensued in which 
the shrieks of the women could be heard above the wind. 
The maniacs added to the terror of the patients, and for 
a time the utmost confusion reigned. However, when it 
was seen that the storm was abating, order was quickly 
restored and the work of searching for the injureci 

begun. « 

The Female Hospital escaped with little damage, the 
roof of the west wing being torn ofl", with numerous 
smaller damages to the interior of the building. A num- 
ber of the inmates were cut by flying missiles, but there 
was not a single serious accident reported. 

The cottage at the Insane Asylum was damaged con- 
siderably by the wind but no one was hurt. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. Ill 

UNION DEPOT POWER HOUSE. 

The Union Depot system of electric roads is one of the 
largest in the world. Its tracks exceed 100 miles in 
length, and to secure power for its Southern divisions a 
mammoth structure was built some four or ^ve years 
ago. It covered an entire block on Geyer, Missouri, and 
Jefferson Avenues. It was not a temporary structure, 
but was massive in the extreme, its masonry and brick 
work giving it a fortress appearance. Its machinery was 
the finest money could buy and its smoke stack reared 
its head so high that it was a local land mark. It was 
one of the highest and strongest smoke stacks ever built, 
and yet it fell before the winds fury just as hopelessly and 
helplessly as a tree with a rotten stem. A cyclist who 
was riding home from his work sought refuge in the 
power house from the rain. In common with everyone 
else he thought it was safe against any storm. 

But he was wrong. The section of the building into 
which he and three others rushed fell almost as soon as 
they entered it. The cyclist crawled out of the wreck, 
bruised and battered, leaving behind the bodies of his 
three companions, all of whom were crushed to death. 
Mr. C. P. Gregory, an oflacial of the company saw the 
building fall, and gave the following vivid description of 
the scene the evening of the storm. 

*' I was standing near the northwest corner of the block, 
in a vacant lot, and was but a few feet from the entrance 
to the machine shop. I saw two threatening cloud strata 
approaching, one from the southeast and the other from 
the southwest — dark and forbidding banks, resting, as it 



112 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

were, upon the green background. These clouds seemed 
to come together with an awful clap of thunder. I at 
once rushed toward the machine shop, yelling to the men 
there, about sixty in number, to get out. Just then the 
mighty force struck the car sheds, which are south of and 
adjoining the power house. The sheds were crushed in 
like an eggshell. There were several teams and coal 
wagons in the shed at the time, and two of the teams, 
with four horses each, were in the ruins. All the horses 
were killed or maimed. I don't know whether the team- 
sters made their escape or not, but fear that all did not. 

*'As the car shed wails and roof went in I yelled to the 
engineer, Zimmerman, who was at his post in the power 
house, to run, but before the poor fellow could make his 
escape, the big brick chimney which stands about the 
middle of the plant, between the two boiler rooms, came 
down with a crash, burying the whole power house plant 
beneath the debris. Zimmerman was instantly killed; 
we only a little while ago succeeded in getting out his 
body. You can get some idea of the terrible force of the 
elements when I say that the car shed was 400x300 feet, 
the brick chimney was 162 feet high by thirty-eight feet in 
diameter at the base, and yet the whole was a huge pile of 
bricks and debris in less than a minute's time. The men 
in the machine shop barely escaped before the car shed 
walls went in. 

**The disaster ties up the whole Scullin system except 
the Bellefontaine and Mound City line, which is supplied 
by another small power house, which escaped injury. 
The first work we shall do is to search the ruins for the 




113 




114 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 115 

rest of the dead, if any there be. I ara down-town to- 
night laying in a supply of tools, and we shall have a 
force of men at work before daylight." 

A MARVEL OF RE -CONSTRUCTION. 

It required ten days of unremitting labor to effect 
temporary repairs to this mammoth structure — not regu- 
lation working days of eight hours each — not even days 
of twelve hours each — but days which extended from 
midnight to midnight. That the damage of the storm 
could be repaired in even a temporary manner in so short 
of time may w^ell be regarded as one of the marvelous 
feats of science and activity. 

It is doubtful, indeed, if any corporation of the kind 
ever accomplished such almost marvelous results in so 
short a space of time. Those who saw the power-house 
on the morning after the storm, with its great brick 
smoke stack in ruins, its massive brick walls crumbled in 
over its machinery, its roof torn asunder and many of its 
cars smashed to pieces, will never forget the spectacle. 
Experts, even giving the company the benefit of the 
doubt and counting on prodigious efforts, in no case 
admitted the possibility of a resumption of the traffic of 
the roads in less than two wrecks. Vice-President Harry 
Scullin said little, but if ever man was equal to the occa- 
sion he so proved himself. Four days after the storm a 
portion of the vast machinery had been cleared off and 
set in motion. The Tower Grove and California 
avenue divisions commenced running at once. A 
temporary roof was built over the working plant. 



116 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

The huge dismantled brick smoke stack was then 
tackled. A force of bricklayers worked from dawn till 
dusk, eating and sleeping on the premises. By night 
another force of men labored, erecting scaffoldings so as 
to be ready for the bricklayers in the morning. And lo! 
the smokestack within a week raised its head higher than 
anything in the neighborhood. It was completed before 
the National Kepublicans convened three weeks after the 
cyclone. This stack, 150 feet high, originally took 10 
weeks in building. 

Sixty additional cars went into service June 7, and a 
horse-power of 3,200 propelled the machinery. The 
full power under normal conditions before the wreck was 
8,000 to 10,000. The bulk of the machinery was still 
exposed to the elements when restarted, though cleared 
from all debris, and the 3,200 horse-power to be used 
was only secured by running the boilers to their high- 
est capacity. They being of the very best tubular make, 
there was no risk in this. 

By the middle of June a permanent roof had been 
placed over the entire power house. 

On the clearing up and restarting of the machinery a 
force averaging 500 men a day was at work for days. 
Mr. Harry Scullin said on the evening of June 6 : 

"Give all the credit to the men. Nothing can be too 
good for them. They have worked with a loyalty and will 
I never saw equaled. Day and night they have stuck 
to the task that at one time seemed almost hopeless. I 
have never had to tell them to stay late or come early. 
They have been here all the time. I am certainly proud 



t 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 117 

of what has been accomplished and equally proud of the 
spirit of loyalty the work has called forth in our men." 

STREET RAILWAY SERVICE PARALYZED. 

The power house of the People's Cable railway was also 
badly wrecked. Hundreds of cars were injured and sever- 
al destroyed. The machinery escaped, but the entire 
second floor was wrecked, and when operations were re- 
sumed, the immense wheels revolved in mid air. The 
storm had moreover the effect of stopping every electric 
street car in St. Louis. The terrific force of the wind 
tore the wires of the lines from their fastenings to the side 
posts and in many instances blew the posts down. Every 
car run on the electric lines in the city was stopped almost 
instantaneously when the storm struck the city. The 
cable cars did not suffer so much. They however, were, 
of course, impeded by the stoppage of the cars crossing 
their lines. 

The Olive street line was stopped by a perfect network 
of wires at Nineteenth street, which stretched across the 
entire open space at the corners. Owing to the prompt 
action of an employe in running to the City Hall for assist- 
ance the wires were cut away and the Olive street line 
resumed operation in about 20 minutes. The Fourth 
street cable was stopped by an immense number of tele- 
graph poles which were blown down on Choteau avenue 
from Fourth street west. The poles were piled across the 
car tracks in all directions. The cable was shut off 
until they could be cleared away. 

The Broadway cable ran successfully through the storm 



118 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



I 



for about five or ten minutes when the destruction of 
buildings on South Broadway effectually barred the street. 
The cable continued to run along all right, but the cars 
were stopped by the vast amount of debris and timbers 
thrown along the tracks. 

The entire Lindell system was stopped by the storm. 
The wires were twisted and torn from the poles and every 
car was broug-ht to a standstill. This was the case wdth 
every electric line in the city, save the Bellefontaine line, 
which was stopped for an hour and a half by the cross 
lines of street railways being blockaded. At the end of 
that time the Bellefontaine managed to resume operations. 

The Chouteau avenue sheds of the Lindell Railway, 
were totally demolished by the storm and an entirely new 
structure will have to be erected. 



HOURS OF HORRIBLE SUSPENSE. 



i 



The wholesale stoppage of the car lines crowded the 
streets with thousands of people on their way home. Every 
doorway and entrance was jammed with frightened men 
and women in momentary danger of being killed by the 
hundreds of live wires, which hungabout in all directions. 
The Olive street line, w^hen it resumed operations after its 
20-minute stop, was so crowded with humanity that 
movement within the cars was an impossibility. People 
got on the cars as far west as Twelfth street in order to 
obtain standing room even when the car returned on its 
west- bound trip. Ladies, running risk of being thrown 
to the ground and killed, frantically caught on to the cars 
while they were in motion in their endeavors to escape 



ij 








1 19 




120 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 121 

from the horrors of electrocution, which threatened every- 
one on the streets. In many instances ladies and young 
women were thrown down and narrowly escaped injury. 
That no serious damage is reported from this direction is 
a mystery. Inquiries among the employes of the various 
roads down town elicited the fact that very few, if any, 
accidents occured to passengers. 

The day following the storm saw fewer street cars run- 
ning than on any. day for years, the service being poorer 
on the whole than in the old horse car regime. Only 
two lines on the 8cullin or Union depot system were in 
operation. The Benton-Bellefontaine ran right along 
and it was the only street car line in the city that was not 
disabled by the storm. The Mound City resumed opera- 
tions early in the morning. All the lines running to the 
Fair Grounds were running except the one on Jefferson 
avenue and Mr. ScuUin's Fair Grounds line. The cars of 
the latter were used on the Mound City road. The 
Union, Northern Central and Cass avenue lines all started 
up about the same time next morning, and the Franklin 
avenue line at 8:30 the fatal evening. The only other 
line operated by the Chicago syndicate is the Southwest- 
ern, which parallels the Broadway line of the same com- 
pany. The Southwestern started up a day or two later 
and proved of immense service to a large number of peo- 
ple living south of Arsenel street in the territory covered 
by some of the Scullin lines. The Southern electric also 
expected to resume operations on a part of its route. It 
runs to Carondelet and is ordinarily patronized by thou- 
sands of people living north of the Wild Hunter's. 



122 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

The Grand avenue line was operated from the water 
tower as far south as the Grand avenue bridge only. The 
service will be extended south of Mill Creek. Another 
line for the Southsiders which was able in a day or 
two to run cars was the Lindell company's new Park 
avenue electric road. It leaves the Compton Heights 
line at Xebraska avenue and continues west on Park 
avenue to Vande venter, and then runs south to Tower 
Grove Park. The company's power house on Park and 
Vandeventer avenues was started up at noon Thursday, 
but the company's lines south of Mill Creek Valley were 
nearly all down and the power was used by the Page, 
Spalding and Delmar av^enue divisions of the Lindell 
system, all running to the West End. 

The Olive street cable did a tremendous business. The ■ 
electric lines operated by the same company, on the other . 
hand, fared badly. The power house from which they 
were operated was partially demolished and it was several 
days before traffic on them was resumed. The Jefferson ' 
avenue line was in the same fix. 

TELEGRAPH WIRES DOWN. 

For several hours after the hurricane St. Louis was cut 
off from all communication with the outside world. Every 
wire, north, east, south and west, was reported down. 

The telegraph and telephone services and the electric \ 
railway lines were crippled, and all street railway traffic 
was temporarily suspended. The damage to the wires 
was estimated Wednesday night at over $100,000. 

The hurricane snapped hundreds of telegraph poles 



- THE GREAT CYCLONE. 123 

throughout the city like twigs, and a perfect labyrinth of 
the deadly overhead wires were precipitated to the ground. 
The casualties from this source were miraculously small, 
in view of the danger to which thousands of people were 
exposed. As it w^as, the twisted wires were a constant 
menace to pedestrians, and scores of people are known to 
have come in contact with live wires. No fatalities were 
reported from this cause, however. 

This w^as due to the fact that all the electric car lines 
shut off their power as soon as they received word that 
the wires were down. 

At 8 o'clock Kansas City was reached by way ot Mex- 
ico, Mo., and later Chicago was communicated with by 
way of Kansas City. The wnres on the Illinois side were 
down for miles. 

Manager Bohle had gangs of men out in all parts of the 
city all night, but the damage was so great that the men 
were unable to do much before daylight. The telegraph 
service was crippled for some time on account of the 
storm. 

The telephone wires, with the exception of a portion of 
the West End circuit, were all down, and the downtow^n 
districts w^ere without telephone service the next day. 

A FATED CORNER. 

The corner of Seventh and Rutger streets may be de- 
scribed as the charnel-house in the path of the storm. 
Thirteen bodies were taken from the ruins of two build- 
ings on this corner within twenty -four hours of the storm, 
and there were still forms under the lieaps of brick and 



124 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

stone that marked the place where the buildings stood. 

A boarding-house stood at the southeast corner. When 
the storm reached it the walls collapsed as though made 
of stiff dough, and the unfortunates inside were entombed 
in the twinkling of an eye. The high wind that swept 
around the corners after the main storm passed created 
an eddy over the ruins into which was tossed a mass of 
debris from the entire neighborhood. The work of rescue 
was difficult and necessarily incomplete. People in the 
neighborhood say there were 40 souls in the house when 
it went down, and but nine corpses have been taken out. 

On the opposite corner from the boarding-house search- 
ers for bodies found four mangled trunks and sent them 
to the morgue. A man half daft with terror assured 
Sergeant Meehan that the body of his wife is buried 
there. He was to excited to give his name, but neighbors 
said he lived in the house, and that the woman has not 
been seen since the storm. 

One mis^ht travel miles and find few more desolate, 
heart-sickening pictures than that around Seventh and 
Rutger streets. A pile of brick and broken timbers 
stretched from curb to curb on the Rutger street side, east 
of Seventh. Along the sidewalk on the north side of the 
street a pathway was being made through the debris, and 
through this the few who had business within the ropes 
that guarded the graves of families were allowed to pass 
by the police. Upon a mass of tangled wreckage, in 
plain view of the curious mob, an old woman sat all day 
surrounded by a few of her battered household goods, 
dug from the wreck. About her were gathered a few 




125 




120 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 127 

friends trying to persuade her to go away. But she would 
not go away. For years and years she lived on that cor- 
ner. Her children were born there, and from the door of 
her house she followed the body of her husband a long 
time ago — so long ago she cannot remember all 
about it. 

She expected to die there in peace and quiet with her 
relatives gathered about her bed, but from the expression 
in her sad, dim eyes, as she gazed on the sickening ruins, 
she would have been satisfied had she gone down with the 
rest, and never known what caused the candle of life to go 
out. And so she would not go away but remained fo/ 
hours, a pale, solitary figure, pathetic and pleading in a 
vista of woe and sorrow. 

The buildings in this vicinity were totally wrecked. 
They cannot be repaired. They represented to the honest 
people who occupied them before the storm, the savings 
of years, and that was being swept away in the space of a 
minute w«s beyond their comprehension. They were 
dumb with vague surprise and went about unable to re- 
alize the full extent of their affliction. It was like a holi- 
day. All the stores were closed and thousands lounged 
in the streets. Men and women stood moodily in sheltered 
places watching the crowds. Some of them had babies 
beside them and the prattle of the little ones sounded 
strangely out of place in the surroundings. On every 
hand were evidences of wreck and ruin. But a saloon 
within 50 feet of the place, where the nine bodies were 
recovered, was doing rushing business and shouts of 
drunken roisterers, mingled with the clink of glasses and 



128 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the jingle of money, resounded mockingly in the ears of 
the stricken and homeless. 

A COMBINATION OF HORRORS. 

Wind, lightning, fire and rain formed the hellish com- 
bination that slaughtered and maimed and rendered house- 
less and destitute scores of defenseless residents of the 
district bounded by Park avenue on the south, Laclede 
avenue on the north, California avenue on the west and 
Dolman street on the east. The entire section presents a 
sickening picture of desolation, ruin and misery. Amid 
the wreck of palatial residences, handsome flats and cot- 
tages less pretentious, the dead and dying have been 
taken out here and there throughout the entire district, 
and every block has horrors upon horrors to relate. 

In many instances the awful work that was begun by 
the tornado's crushing force was made doubly terrible by 
fire, and when the elements had spent their fury the 
flames blackened the wreckage in token of the ruin that 
had been wrought. In more than one case people who 
were pinioned beneath fallen walls and debris were 
burned to death before the eyes of family or friends who 
were powerless to aid them, and many others would have 
died equally horrible deaths but for the bravery of the 
rescuers. 

Nothing that lay directly in the path of the storm 
seemed capable of withstanding the terrific force of the 
wind. Great stones weighing thousands of pounds were 
carried for blocks and dropped wherever the wind seemed 
disposed to leave them. Some of the most substantial 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 129 

buildings in town were leveled to the ground, while per- 
haps an old dilapidated structure next door escaped with- 
out injury. 

Probably the most remarkable case in point is the de- 
struction of the power house of the People's Railroad, 
(Fourth street cable) , at 1801 Park avenue, already re- 
ferred to. It was a massive structure, only three stories 
in its tallest part, and built of pressed brick and stone. 
The walls ranged from 20 to 30 inches in thickness, yet 
they were crushed as though they were built of paper. 
The entire top story of the main office building was 
thrown into the street, and the engine room was unroofed 
and wrecked. The damage was 1100,000, to say nothing 
of the loss that accrued from the suspension of traffic on 
the road. 

When the roof was lifted off great stones and a perfect 
storm of massive timbers were rained down int-o the en- 
gine room. The big steam pipe leading to the engine on 
the west side was broken and every car on the road 
stopped almost instantly. The roar of escaping steam 
added to the confusion and for a time it was thought 
everybody in the place would be killed. The engineer, 
D. G. McCarron, was in the engine room and had a nar- 
row escape from death. The car sheds on the block to 
the south w^ere unroofed and partially demolished, and a 
number of cars smashed into kindling wood. Manager 
Mahoney put a force of 100 men, mostly employes of 
the road, to work cleaning away the debris and getting 
in shape to rebuild the power house. 



130 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

HANDSOME RESIDENCES DESTROYED. 

From there all the way out Park avenue to beyond 
Nebraska, almost every other house is more or less dam- 
aged, and a large majority of them are total wrecks. This 
is particularly true of the magnificent residences to the 
north of Lafayette Park. 

The Soderer house, on the corner of Missouri and Park 
avenues, was badly damaged. The stable was a mass of 
ruins, and a fine horse and its driver, a colored man named 
Taylor, were buried under the debris. Both were killed. 
Julius Houck, brother of the Doctor, who lives at 2320 
Park avenue, has a house that is not fit to live in. Two 
flats adjoining, owned by his mother-in-law, are a total 
wreck. 

The house on Park avenue, near Twenty -second street, 
where Alexander Selkirk boarded with his wife, is a mass 
of ruins. Mrs. Selkirk lost everything — handsome orna- 
ments, jewelry and her clothes. 

The house of Jerome Hill, the cotton factor, was 
dismantled, with great gaps everywhere, the top gone, 
and lightless windows. All the family were at home the 
next morning removing furniture, and trying to save from 
the debris what was savable. 

John Endres, who lives next door to Mr. Hill, directed 
the moving of his belongings out of his devasted place. 
In spite of his loss, Mr. Endres good-naturedly said, he 
was only glad nobody in his house was hurt. He had 
spread a luncheon on the parlor mantle, a couple of bot- 
tles of wine from the cellar had been saved, and he in- 
sisted upon everybody in his household taking a bite to 




131 




132 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 133 

sustain their courage. His four daughters and the two 
Misses Wamsganz, sisters of Mrs. Endres, went to stop 
with their grandmother until Mr. Endres could make 
other provisions for his family. He slept part of the 
night on the floor of the Carr residence, next to his own, 
and, like a faithful watchman, got up every half hour 
to see if his chatties were all right. Mr. Endres' courage 
and philosophy over his loss, did much to inspire his 
neighbors with the same sort of feelings. 

Mrs. James Carr, relict of the late Judge Carr, with 
her sons and daughters, lives next door to Mr. Endres. 
Her house was the least damaged of any of those on that 
side of the street, though there was not a whole pane of 
glass left in it. Mr. James Carr, Jr., was busy putting 
in the broken windows, after having spent part of the 
ni2!;ht in helping Mr. Endres to bring a little order out of the 
chaos. Mrs. Carr housed a number of bleeding and fainting 
neighbors, and beds were made all over the floor to take 
care of the homeless. She attributes the saving of her 
house to the solidity with which it is built, but equally 
strong houses proved the fallacy of such reliance. 

The Misses Carr had just returned from the wedding 
of Miss Fisher to Mr. Leon Fasset in the little Church 
of the Unity in Benton place. The wedding guests had 
barely left the church when the roof blew off, and they 
all ran for their lives. Miss Carr has in her possession 
two mackintoshes and four umbrellas which she found 
in the church, and has taken care of, awaiting their 
owners. The Carr family sought refuge in the cellar 
between two large brick piers, which swayed and rocked, 



134 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

but did not give way. The wind tried itself in the Carr 
residence without doing great damage, but it tore frames 
from doors, broke locks in half, twisted one hinge off a 
door and left the other on, shattered some window panes, 
while it scratched others in zig-zag fashion, drove enor- 
mous boards through one side of the house in the third 
story, and never moved a wooden bucket from an 
unsheltered position in the yard. 

SAW^ HER CHILDREN BURN. 

Horror's crown of horrors was reached at the home of 
John Bene, 1400 Ohio avenue, just off Park avenue, 
where the house was first wrecked and then burned. Mrs. 
Bene and her two children, Sylvester, aged 5, and Oliver, 
her two year-old babe, were buried under the debris, and 
the latter was burned to death before his mother's eyes. 
Sylvester, the next older child, was also badly burned, 
but a corps of rescuers succeeded in digging down to 
where he lay before life was extinct. The poor little fellow 
was unconscious and his skull is fractured in addition to 
the severe burns he received. Mrs. Bene could see her 
little ones from where she lay pinioned under some heavy 
timbers. The wreckage was on fire all around her, and 
she was being slowly roasted to death, but seemingly 
oblivious to her own danger and the excruciating pain she 
must have been suffering, she implored the rescuers to 
cease their efforts to reach her and sav^e her babies instead. 
The maternal instinct in her was so strong as to overcome 
all physical pain. When she was taken out she was 
found to be badly burned about the legs, hips and feet. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 13.") 

and bruised from head to foot by falling bricks and tim- 
bers. When she learned that one of her babies was dead 
and the other probably fatally injured she fainted. 

Five people were instantly killed by the demolition of 
the home of the Schwerdtman's, at Ohio and St. Vincent 
avenues. The house was wrecked till not one brick 
remained upon another, and the entire family w^as buried 
beneath the ruins. C. Schwerdtman and his old mother 
were found side by side, dead. The bodies of Mrs. H. 
Schwerdtman and her two children were taken from under 
the debris an hour later. Mr. Schwerdtman, husband of 
the latter, was on his way home when the storm broke. 
When he reached there and found the house in ruins, and 
his wife, children, mother and brother, dead, he was 
almost frantic with grief, and his friends feared for a time 
that he would lose his reason. 

Two blocks further north, at 2700 Caroline street, the 
grocery store owned by Anton Rubald, was buried under 
the wreck of the three-story building in which it was 
located. Rubald sought safety in the celler, but his head 
and back were severely cut and bruised. The grocery stock 
was almost a total loss. Mrs. E. Filsinger's home, at 
2635 Caroline, was blown down and she was badly hurt. 
She was taken to the Rebekah Hospital. 

HOMELESS AND DESTITUTE. 

When the first grey streaks of dawn began to break on 
the eastern horizon, the terrified residents of the district 
at the south approach of the Jefferson avenue bridge 
resumed their search for the dead in the wrecked tenement 



18G THE ORE AT CYCLOXE. 

at 814 South Jefferson avenue. The corpses of Mrs. 
Clay pool and her daughter Cora, were taken out during 
the night. Two and possibly three more bodies they 
knew were buried under the mass of brick and timber in 
which they had delved till after midnight. By 9 o'clock 
the remains of old Mrs. Cahill were reached and a little 
later Ethel Claypool's crushed and bloody body was taken 
out. They were sent to the morgue. In the same house 
Baby Barnett, aged 3, had her back broken, and her 
aunt, Mrs. Holland, was seriously^ hurt. A man named 
Irwin, livmg at 2712 Chouteau avenue, had his head 
crushed in a carpet factory at Twenty-second and 
Chouteau. 

LaSalle street, a short thoroughfare running from 
Eighteenth to Jefferson avenue, is probably the most 
Godforsaken looking place in town. The storm injured 
a number of people living there and left nearly every 
family along the street homeless and destitute. Their 
misery was increased by the inability of moving vans to 
cart the remnants of their household effects elsewhere on 
account of hanging wires. Annie and Lydia, the two 
little children of John Hubli, living at 2313 LaSalle, were 
both injured by the roof falling in on them. Hubli's 
belongings were blown into the street, as were those of 
Mrs. Prack, a widow living up stairs. A bureau was 
blown out of one of Mrs. Brack's windows. George 
Weinter's furniture was scattered all over the street and 
broken to pieces. Nearly every family living in the 
neigh Vjorhood suffered a similar loss and many of them 
will be entirely dependent upon charity for some time. 



V fc 




137 




138 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 139 

The most serious injury reported was that to Mrs. Ackert, 
2813 LaSalle, whose back was broken by flying timbers. 

Wallace Buckner and Guy Harvey, both colored, living 
at Jefferson and Chouteau avenues, were killed by the col- 
lapse of a brick tenement. Mrs. Abbie Woods, colored, 
was seriously injured by falling walls at her home, 2321 
Papin street. Gratiot street from Eighteenth street east 
to Sixteenth, is lined on both sides with warehouses, all 
of which were razed to the ground. The block between 
Chouteau avenue and Hickory street on Armstrong ave- 
nue is probably the most complete wreck in the city. 
Every house, some of them handsome two-story affairs, 
was blown down and the street rendered impassable by 
bricks, timbers and broken roofs. Not a house escaped. 

Selkirk's storas^e house at Eiojhteenth street* and Chou- 
teau avenue was badly wrecked. The roof was taken off 
and the rear wall torn out. R. D. Leonori's warehouse, 
at Jefferson and Chouteau avenues, which was filled to the 
roof with furniture, is in ruins and the contents are badlv 
damaged. The roof was blown off the St. Louis Coffin 
Company's plant at Fourteenth and Poplar streets, and 
the top story of Butler's warehouse at Eighteenth street 
and Chouteau avenue is gone. 

HORSES KILLED IN HARNESS. 

The Lindell Railway car sheds and repair house at 2330 
Chouteau and extending across LaSalle street, were badly 
damaged and half a dozen cars were broken to pieces. 
An employe named Bryant, living at 2615 Rutger, had 
his arm broken. The car sheds of the Jefferson Avenue 



140 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Line, adjoining the Lindell repair shop, were partially 
wrecked and two cars were destroyed. The wires are 
down and the line will not be running before Sunday. 

The engine house at Eighteenth and Hickory streets 
was razed to the foundation. Two fine grey horses were 
killed as they stood side by side in harness ready to re- 
spond to an alarm that had just come in. The engine was 
out and there were only two or three firemen in the house 
at the time. The St. Louis Wire Mill is in ruins and so 
is the Oriel Glass Company's plant, just west of it. Over 
a thousand panes of glass were broken there. The vacant 
block to the south is strewn with wreckage of every de- 
scription. The National Brewery, at Eighteenth and the 
railroad tracks, was partially unroofed. Singularly 
enough the-tall shot tower, across the tracks at Twenty- 
second street, was unscathed, while Osborn's harvester 
factory, near by, had its roof blown off. L'Ouverture 
school was so badly damaged that it had to be closed up. 

DESOLATION AND DESTRUCTION. 

Looking south from the Jefferson avenue bridge was an 
unbroken panorama of wrecked homes, business houses, 
broken street cars, prostrate telegraph wires and over- 
turned sheds. The street was filled with rubbish of every 
description and the scene of desolation and destruction 
spread as far to tlie south as the eye could see. It would 
furnish columns upon columns of most frightful recital in 
itself, were it not for the fact that such an area w?.s cov- 
ered by the storm that what happened to a single street 
was dwarfed by the appalling nature of the whole. 



i 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 141 

Beautiful Benton place, with its homes and garden-like 
surroundings, was wrecked from center to circumference. 
On this phice was the handsome residence of Anthony 
Ittner, which stood on the corner. It was totally demolish- 
ed. Miss Isabel Ittner's bed blew out of the front window in 
the third story and was found, after a weary search, on 
the sidewalk, under a lot of rubbish. The next house to 
the Ittner mansion was that of Mrs. Valle, which was de- 
stroyed, as was the delightful home of Mrs. L. B. Baker. 
Mrs. Baker, with her little daughter, had just returned 
from down town, and had not been in the house long 
when the furious elements be^ran to revolt. The whole 
family huddled under a kitchen table, clinging together 
and comforting each other as best they could. It will 
cost $8,000 at least to rebuild the house, to say nothing 
of the furnishing. The piano is a total wreck, but Mrs. 
Baker's handsome saddle horse was saved. The resi- 
dences of Mrs. Rainwater and Mrs. Haydock fared a simi- 
lar fate. 

LOSSES TO BL^SINESS CONCERNS. 

The following business losses were noted in the small 
districts bounded by Eleventh, Dolman, Lafayette avenue 
and Market street. 

The building occupied by the Enno Sander Mineral 
Water Company, 125 to 129 South Eleventh street, was 
damaged to the extent of about $1,000 and the stock 
about $300. 

The Purina Mills, on the southwest side of Twelfth 
street bridge, were completely destroyed. The building, 



142 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

owned by the St. Louis Bagging Company, was an old 
structure, worth probal)ly $5,000. The stock of purina, 
owned by the Robinson -Da nforth Commission Company, 
was utterly disintegrated. The damage to it will be al- 
most $5,000. The company will at once engage new 
quarters and there will be no delay in their business. 

Two girls employed in the mills remained in the build- 
ing throughout the tornado and, while the walls around 
them wei*e rent asunder, they escaped uninjured. An 
aged horse, kept around the premises for the sake of old 
acquaintance, was injured in the back and died. 

M. M. Buck's warehouse, 810 to 826 South Twelfth 
street,, was damaged about $1, 500. 

SWAMPED BY THEIR NEIGHBOR. 

The Shickle, Harrison cfe Howard Iron Company's big 
plant on Twelfth street, rear of Chouteau avenue, suf- 
fered injuries that will cost about $10,000 to repair. 
Much of this was done by the unwelcome advent of a 
portion of M. M. Buck's warehouse from the other side 
of the street. The machine shop was wrecked, the hay 
barn and pattern shop badly twisted around, the stable 
was blown down and the roof of the foundry taken off. 
The 500 men employed escaped uninjured despite the fly- 
ing brick bats and other debris. 

The Haydock building, on Fourteenth street, near 
Chouteau avenue, was damaged about $10,000. Part of 
the ornamental center of the Fourteenth street end fell to 
the street, while the roof and part of the rear walls 
crumbled in. The loss on stock will be to the Haydock 




143 




Pi 

O 

§ Q 

W W 

^ J 



en a 

O S3 

W 
Q 
'^ 

D 



144 



THE GKEAT CYCLONE. 145 

Brothers' Carriage Company about 1500. The Bauer- 
Walter Carriage Company and Stromberg, Kraus cfcCo., 
trunk manufacturers, who occupy portions of the struc- 
ture, escaped with slight damages. 

The Griesedieck Artificial Ice Company, at Thirteenth 
and Papin, lost their three smokestacks, which, besides 
partially crippling the works, caused a loss in the vicinity 
of 11,000. 

TREMENDOUS DAMAGE. 

The superintendent of Station C, Laclede Gas Com- 
pany, on South Fourteenth street, held up his hands 
when asked as to damages sustained by the plant. "One 
hundred and fifty thousand dollars will not cover it," he 
replied. "We are torn up in all directions. Our Pintsch 
plant is only slightly hurt, say about $500, but one of 
our storage holders is wrecked. All the gas has escaped, 
our buildings are, some of them, demolished and we are 
in a bad way." The huge circular storage holder was 40 
feet high when struck. It quickly settled down almost 
to the level of the ground. One man, Frank Benson, 
was injured by flying missiles. 

The St. Louis CofRn Company, who conduct their bus- 
iness in two immense buildings at Thirteenth and Poplar 
street, lost part of the upper story of one and the roof of 
the other. With the damage to stock etc., the loss will, 
it is estimated, be over $10,000. 

The Lafayette Park Stal)le, operated by Heier <fe 
Wiebush, was, like everything else around the City 
Hospital, ruinously handled by the tornado. The loss 
10 



146 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

on the buildings, which were practically demolished, will 
be about $10,000. That on the plant is still greater. 
It includes one hearse, six carriages and light buggies, 
nine surreys, 13 vehicles of all kinds belonging to board- 
ers and a stock of coffins and hardware. Everything was 
split into matches. It cannot be replaced under 130,000, 
making a total damage of 140,000. 

H. Keemt's grocery, and another building owned by 
him, at 1800 South Fourth street, were damaged fully 
13,000. 

Mrs. Walker, who owns four houses and stores on the 
east and north sides of the City Hospital, loses about 
$4,000 on them. 

DAMAGE TO HOMES OX ONE STREET. 

Dolman street, going south from Chouteau avenue, 
presented an awful appearance. Up till the fatal night 
it was a pretty shaded thoroughfare, with comfortable 
residences on either side. Next day its shade trees lay 
prone in all positions across the street or the front yards 
of the houses. Telegraph poles and wires, roofing, bricks 
plastering and lumber help to make the scene one of 
desolation. From Chouteau avenue to Lafayette scarcely 
a house escaped injury and almost all were badly wrecked. 
Among the latter were: 

Nos. 1201 and 1203, owned by George Peisch, and 
demolished to the extent of 13,000. Both were occupied 
by families who deserted them for safer quarters before 
the tornado came. 

No. 1221, completely destroyed; value $3,000; 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 147 

owned by Conrad Soehlmann. This was a two-story 
brick, rented by Mary Reardon, who was partially buried 
in the ruins, but was rescued by neighbors. Her daughter 
is employed as cashier at Philip Boeder's stationery store, 
on North Fourth street. After the storm. Miss Reardon 
walked towards home, little dreaming of the awful sight 
that was to greet her eyes. Mrs. Reardon was painfully 
cut. Their furniture, valued at about $600, was ruined. 

Nos. 1223 and 1225, also owned by Conrad Soehl- 
mann, was damaged $1,000. 

Nos. 1227 and 1229, owned by Mrs. Koch, were 
simply obliterated. Loss $9,000. 

Nos. 1304 and 1306, owned by Mr. Howe, were 
damaged $2,000. 

Mrs. Lange, a widow, owned three houses opposite, 
which cannot be repaired under $5,000. 

No. 1315, a stone -front two -story house, owned by 
Mr. Kiesewetter, was damaged $4, 000. 

Mrs. Kraft owned and occupied No. 1317, which 
was badly torn apart. Damage $3,000. 

C. E. Miller owned No. 1431, which lost the roof and 
windows, worth $1,000. 

Klauber & Son's property at 1435, was wrecked to the 
extent of fully $2,000. 

Mr. Nelson, the contractor, suffered a loss of about 
$3,000 on his place at 1436 Dolman. 

Nos. 1420 and 1422, owner unknown, are demolished 
in part. Loss estimated at $2,000. 

No. 1613, owner unknown, will cost at least $1,500 to 
straighten out. 



148 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Almost every badly damaged house on Dolman street 
was deserted at once. As fast as they could find other 
quarters, families moved out. Scores of furniture wagons 
were being loaded up there the day after the saddest of 
all sad days. 

AROUND THE CITY HOSPITAL. 

On Lafayette avenue at 1556 to 1564, a two-story block, 
owner not known, lost almost all its upper floors. The 
loss exceeded 13,000. 

Nos. 1622 and 1620 South Thirteenth street were just half 
gone. Damage, $1,500. 

At 1411 Carroll street the entire upper portion was 
swept away, and the occupants, who had fled down stairs, 
were in a mournful fix. Loss about $1,000. 

The entire front of 1410 Dillon street was blown off. 
Damage, $1,000. 

That historical landmark known as "Cracker Castle," 
at St. Ange and Chouteau avenues, owned by Major 
Chai'les E. Pearce, and occupied by Mr. Frederick Spies, 
was struck by lightning during the tornado. It was once 
almost the handsomest and best appointed residence in 
that section, but the storm has sealed its fate. Its large 
tower was hurled onto the western portion of the build- 
ing, which it demolished. The loss would be in the neigh- 
borhood of $3,000, but the castle will doubtless be torn 
down. 

The upper part of 1025 St. Ange avenue was borne, 
away by the storm. Loss over $1,000. 




149 




150 



THE grp:at cyclone. 15L 

MANY DEAD HERE IN A WRECKED TERRITORY. 

Search for the bodies of the victims of the tornado, sup- 
posed to be still on the vacant lot opposite the old mar- 
ket was tedious, owing to the small force of men at work. 
The ruin of the market was most colossal and complete, 
and it was owing partly to the extent of the area to be dug 
over that the work of recovering the bodies progressed 
slowly. 

Sixteen men, under the direction of George Dace, 
worked all day and far into the night in the ruins. The 
next morning the body of George Howard was dug out of 
the debris at the extreme west end of the market. How- 
ard was connected with the circus which had been exhib- 
iting on the vacant lot opposite the market, which was 
blov/n out of existence. 

An immense crowd of curious people watched the 
searchers at work and interfered greatly with the work- 
men during the evening. The workmen were divided into 
three squads, located at three different points in the ruins 
near the center of the market. At 9 o'clock at night sev- 
eral of the workmen, who had reached the basement, 
thought they could hear a faint cry for help from under 
the debris on the northern side. The news was quickly 
communicated to the crowd, and a hush of expectancy fell 
upon the spectators as the men worked like beavers in 
their haste to reach the point from which the cry was sup- 
posed to have come. Diligent search failed to reveal any 
signs of a human body, and although the searching party 
shouted lustily into the ruins, no answering cry re- 
sponded. 



15*2 'j'HP^ GKKaT CVCLOXI^J. 

NOTHING WAS SPAKED. 

On South Twenty -first street, near the Mill Creek Val- 
ley, desolation was universal. A photograph of the scene 
from 300 South Twenty -first street to the south end of 
the bridge would tell the story better than words. Not 
a single building, telegraph pole, tree or sign seemed to 
have escaped. The street and sidewalk was an almost 
solid mass of debris — bricks, broken telephone and tele- 
graph poles, tin roofing, water spouts, broken signs and 
broken glass, while the wires covered the whole in an in- 
terminable netting, just high enough off the ground to 
catch pedestrians across the face and under the chin, a 
few being low enough to trip one's toes by way of varia- 
tion. 

At 310 South Twenty-first street, the J. F. Swift & 
Co. fresh meat establishment is located, and just here the 
hurricane began business for the first time on Twenty - 
first street. Not a single window in the building re- 
mained intact, the whole place being flooded. 

The stock of $3,000 worth of meat was covered with 
water, bits of broken glass and flying mud and sand. 
The managers, however, made necessary deliveries two 
days later. The damage to the building was 1500. 

Officer Bart Keaney, on the Twenty -fii'st and Clark 
avenue beat, deserves much credit for the heroic work he 
did in assisting to rescue the injured from the wrecked 
store at 2102 Clark avenue. When the storm struck the 
store it went down without warning. Bridget Gunn, 
2722 Sheridan; Gertie McKenna, 2108 Eugenia street, 
and John O'Connor, of 2109 Adams street, were in the 



J 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 15»^ 

store at the time, and were buried under falling timbers 
and brick walls. Miss Gunn's legs were both broken, 
left arm broken between wrist and elbow and skull frac- 
tured. She was sent to the City Hospital. 

Gertie McKenna was injured internally. 

O'Connor has a broken arm, a scalp wound and inter- 
nal injuries. 

Grone's brewery, at Twenty -second and Clark avenue, 
was almost totally wrecked. 

The Scandinavian Church, southeast corner Twenty- 
third and Clark, was picked up and turned completely over. 

At the Gates Wire Mill, Twenty-first and Gratiot, a 
scene indescribable was met with. An immense portion 
of the roof of the building lies piled up high on the south 
end of the bridge, while all around a mass of wires, 
poles, roofing and tons of other debris made the vicinity 
utterly impenetrable. Mr. Lippies, who was employed 
in the Gates mill said that four were badly hurt, two 
fatally. Mr. Lippies could not explain how it happened 
that of the 300 or more boys and men who were in the 
building only four were hurt, but he explained that he 
thought the vivid flashes of the burning electric light 
wires under the Twenty-first street bridge proved to be a 
miraculous warning, causing many who might otherwise 
have been crushed to death, to flee to a place of safety. 

Mr. Lippies himself ran out of the building to see 
what the trouble really was, and, no sooner had he 
entered the open yard east of the building, than he w^as 
picked up bodily and carried over the companys wood- 
shed, landing in his own back yard. 



154 THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 

He was dazed, but not hurt, and, jumping to his feet, 
entered his back door and ran into the arms of his wife 
before he knew what had really happened. 

The Sawyer Manufacturing Company, 1819 Chouteau 
avenue, suffered greatly, the building being almost 
totally wrecked. Four people were injured. 

The Eden Publishing house, at 17I6 Chouteau, was 
also a heavy loser. The building was unroofed and the 
stock damaged. 

Gieren's druo; store, on the corner of Twelfth and 
Chestnut, was badly smashed. 

St. John's Church, on Hickory street, lost its steeple. 

The Liederkranz Hall, Chouteau avenue and Thirteenth 
street, was unroofed and the entire building flooded with 
water. 

Alexander's saloon. Eighteenth and Chouteau, was 
considerably damaged. 

The Brown Tobacco Company, across the street from 
Alexander's saloon, lost the top story of its building. 

Spilker's drug store, 1801 Chouteau, suffered severely. 

The south wall of the nail department of the St. Louis 
Wire Company was wrecked, fire breaking out a little 
after 10 o'clock. 

Fire also helped to complete the destruction of the Gates 
Wire Mill, breaking out immediately after the storm. 

SEARCHING FOR THEIR HUSBANDS. 

4 

The district bounded by Market, Chouteau, Broadway 
and the wharf was a complete wreck. The streets were 
filled with wreckage, the upper stories of the old build- 




156 




166 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 157 

ings were blown in and the roofs of many buildings car- 
ried away. Many people were injured by flying bricks, 
wood, signs and the like, and were treated at the neigh- 
boring drug stores. A few of them were taken to the 
hospital and thence to the Good Shepherd Convent. It 
was claimed that quite a number lay buried under the 
demolished buildings, but it required days to tell the tale, 
as nothing could be done in the storm and darkness of 
the night toward searching the ruins. It was impossible 
to get the ambulances east of Third street, although it 
was reported that a number of dead and injured were 
lying in the district east. The drivers w^ere unable to get 
to them, try how they would. 

The broken telegraph and telephone wires and poles 
impeded progress everywhere, so that no investigation of 
the casualties could be made. Everywhere desolation 
and ruin greeted the eye. Tenement houses were caved 
in and the unhappy tenants were shivering in the cold, 
chilly rain on the sidewalks. Frightened women clus- 
tered about the windows of the great manufacturing build- 
ings, crying and praying for deliverance from the catas- 
trophe occurring on all sides. The men dashed here and 
there in great excitement, as the thunder crashed and the 
lightning flashed, and tried to quiet the fears of the women. 
It was an exciting scene in this great wholesale and man- 
ufacturing district while the storm was at its height. 

GAS WORKS W^RECKED. 

As the storm was at its height the gasholder at station 
C of the Laclede Gas Company, located at Fifteeilth and 



158 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Gratiot streets, collapsed. There was no noise or explo- 
sion, but the neighborhood was terrified by the sight of 
columns of burning gas leaping high in the air. The 
tank was nearly full at the time, and the full force of the 
wind caught it and turned it over. As the immense iron 
columns, which supported the tank proper fell, the gas 
was ignited and burned for a few moments at a fearful 
rate. Nearly all of the columns fell in the grounds of 
the company. They are 115 feet long. 

One of the columns fell across Fifteenth street, and 
pinioned a young colored girl by the legs. It was two 
hours before she could be extricated. 

FALLEN BUILDINGS EVERYWHERE. 

Proceedinor south from Chestnut street on Thii'd a scene 
of woeful devastation met the eye on either side. The 
street was strewn with fragments of roofing, chimney 
tops, broken glass, bricks and telegraph poles, while the 
wires were coiled in every direction. In some places the 
huge demolished poles blocked the street; wagons broken 
to pieces or upset were numerous. The frightened peo- 
ple had in many cases taken refuge in the lower stories, 
sometimes in the cellars of their homes, fearing a fresh 
outbreak, as the lightning continued to flash, the w^ind 
roared and the water still poured down in drenching tor- 
rents. Scarcely a house escaped injury. Scarcely a pane 
of glass remained intact. Water flooded almost every 
domicile, and men, women and children, who retained 
their practical senses, busied themselves endeavoring to 
secure 'dry quarters for the night. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 159 

The factory of the Dodson-Hils Pickle and Sauce Manu- 
facturing Company, at 732 South Second street, was very 
badly wrecked. Corner saloons and stores seemed to 
have come in for the worst effects of the destructive ele- 
ment. 

A glance at the big elevator of the St. Louis United 
Elevator Company, near the river, at Chouteau avenue, 
revealed the fact that the entire upper portion had been 
blown away. 

The mammoth establishment of the N. K. Fairbank 
Company, soap manufacturers, at Third and Convent 
streets, suffered severely. Its tanks and outbuildings 
were scattered in all directions. Its soap was demol- 
ished, its windows blown out and its stacks of barrels dis- 
persed over the adjoining country. 

UNION CLUB W^RECKED. 

The Union Club's home is, or was, one of the hand- 
some pressed brick buildings which go to make the La- 
fayette park vicinage architecturally beautiful. This 
magnificent building was completed about two years ago. 
Its apartments were spacious. It had handsome parlors 
and smoking rooms; billiard and card rooms; in fact, all 
the accommodations for a modern clubhouse. The build- 
ing was three stories high and about 80x120 feet, and its 
lower walls are now standing and the losi is almost total. 
Within 100 feet of the clubhouse is ihe Lafayette Park 
church and across the street from it towards the west, is 
the Protestant Episcopal church, also a wreck. In none of 
these public buildings did a death result from the storm. 



160 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

although Mr. Michel, the steward at the club, received se- 
vere bruises. 

Of all the homes on Lafayette avenue, the Duestrow 
homestead has in recent months attracted most attention. 
Like other homes in this neighborhood, it is a wreck. 
The building is four stories high, built of stone, and one 
of the handsomest residences in that part of the city. 

Next to the Duestrow homestead is the residence of 
Mr. G. E. Wetzel, at 2327 Lafayette avenue. The Wet- 
zel home was also an attractive residence and is now al- 
most a total wreck. It is occupied by Mr. and Mrs. 
Wetzel and Mr. and Mrs. Ringer. 

Before telling more about the marvelous escapes in this 
section of the city, an observation which will almost uni- 
versally apply should be made. That the loss of life in 
the dozen blocks which surround Lafayette park did not 
run into the thousands is due to the fact that the people 
rushed to the basements. Hundreds of families saved 
their lives by this means. They seemed to know intui- 
tively where the safest room was located and sought it at 
once where there Avas no basement, without being able 
themselves to tell just why they did so. 

LIVES LOST IN A FIRE. 

Fear was added to the fury of the storm by an alarm 
of fire from the great plant of the St. Louis Refrigerator 
and Wooden Gutter Co., 1200 South Main street. It 
was a four-story building, magnificently equipped. The 
hungry flames ate up the interior and gnawed at the walls 
with impunity, for tliere was only one fire engine in 




161 



11 




162 



TPIE GREAT CYCLONE. 163 

sight, and it looked like a pigniy battling with a giant. 

The network of wires blown down was so complete that 
the streets were impassable, and the Fire Department 
became powerless. 

The flames fanned by the fury of the atmospheric 
eruptions, cavorted like demons and wrapped their liquid 
tongues around the wavering walls. At last they fell 
with a crash that was heard and felt for miles and the fire 
fiend was satisfied. 

The material damage was estimated at $200,000. 

The Aluminum bicycle factory at Main street and P^rk 
avenue, belonging to the same company, was unroofed but 
escaped the flames. Many lives were lost in the building. 

The factory employed over 300 hands, and as they 
were still at work when the crasli came, followed by the 
fire, it is marvelous that any of them escaped., 

A HUGE FACTORY DESTROYED. 

One of the greatest freaks of the wind was the havoc 
wrought at Liggett <fe Myers tobacco factory in the west 
end of the city. This plant is to be the largest in the 
world of its class, and consists of some thirteen building's 
grouped close together. All lie east and west and appar- 
ently directly in tlie storm's progress. The natural infer- 
ence would be that all were damaged to an approximately 
equal extent, but the effect was far different. The build- 
ings in the south group were practically completed, but 
escaped entirely, while the group to the north, less than 
100 feet away, sustained all the damage. This group 
consisted of six buildings which were only in the early 



164 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

stages of erection, and for the most part, had merely the 
steel structural work in place. This had the effect of a 
monster network, which, it would be supposed, the wind 
would pass through freely and without damage. Certainly 
it would be expected that the damage would be equal all 
alono; the line, but the result was far different. The order 
of the buildings from west to east was: Warehouse No. 
1, warehouse No. 2, the stemmery, the powerhouse, the 
licorice factory and offices. The tornado passed the first 
half of warehouse No. 1, demolished the second half, over- 
looked No. 2, destroyed the stemmery, killing a number 
of men, neglected the powerhouse, and destroyed the 
licorice factory. 

The damage was about about 1150,000, and the Secre- 
tary of the company issued this statement the following 
day: 

' ' The new plant of thirteen buildings in process of con- 
struction for the Liggett Sl Myers Tobacco Company has 
suffered seriously from the cyclone. The stemmery build- 
ing, one -half completed, is a total wreck. The rehand- 
ling building, or warehouse, finished, is not Vjadly dam- 
aged. Part of the roof and the cornice of the licorice 
factory have been torn away, but the loss is not seriouj^. 
The east end of the box factory and the office building 
are badly wrecked. 

''In relation to Thomas Clark &, Sons, as contractors, 
they are required to furnish the building material and 
construct the plant entire. The company's contract with 
them calls for the delivery of the completed plant Sep- 
tember 15 next. Of course, the contractors are the losers 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 165 

froDi the result of the cyclone on the buildings, but it is 
fair to presume that they are secured by bondsmen from 
sub -contractors in the same way that the company is secured 
by responsible bondsmen from them. If that is the case 
the loss will not fall heavily on any one of the contractors. 

"Thomas Clark & Sons contracted to build the plant 
for $1,000,000. The company put in its own founda- 
tions at a cost of $250,000. Its officers feel confident 
that the contractors will be able to fulfill their agreement 
with it to the letter." 

The site of this immense plant has Lawrence street as 
its eastern boundary and Tower Grove avenue as its west- 
ern boundary. It has a f rontage'of 2, 400 feet on Park 
avenue and a like frontage on Folsom avenue. The build- 
ings are of iron and brick, and they cover nearly the whole 
of the site, while they are planned to range from four to 
six stories in height. 

It was in one of these immense unfinished structures — 
the warehouse — that death came in a most sickening man- 
ner to workmen. The iron -work was four stories high, 
and beneath it was a basement eight feet deep. The 
workmen were seeking shelter in this basement when the 
ponderous iron-work, with its massive steel posts and 
girders, toppled before the violent cyclone and crashed 
down upon them. Nine-tenths of the victims were St. 
Louisans. 

It was at one time believed the number of deaths here 
alone was in the hundreds, as 500 men were employed. 
Most of them had just left the building when it fell, and 
were thus providentially saved. 



l<Ui TIIK GUEAT CYCLONK. 

CHURCHES WRECKED. 

The total loss of cliurcli property in St. Louis from the 
tornado amounted to over $400,000, distributed as 
follows: Koman Catholic, $225,000; German Evangeli- 
cal, $55,000; Episcopal, $35,000; Methodist Episcopal 
South, $25,000; Baptist, $20,000; Presbyterian, $19,000; 
Unitarian, $10,000; German Evangelical, $10,000; 
Christian, $8,000. It is impossible to arrive at the exact 
loss, because none of the churches partially destroyed 
have been examined by the architects to ascertain what 
portion of them can be used in reconstruction. Conserv- 
ative officers of the churches have estimated the amount of 
destroyed and damaged churches, twenty-four in number, 
in various amounts, which round out the sum total here- 
tofore given. Of the number of churches given above, 
seven are complete wrecks. Of the Catholic Churches, 
the Annunciation and St. John of Xepomuk were totally 
destroyed. The Lafayette Park Baptist, Mt. Calvary 
Episcopal, Memorial Methodist South, McCausland Ave- 
nue Presbyterian and Compton Heights Christian Churches 
shared the same fate. 

It will be some time until arrangements are perfected 
to rebuild some of the churches, owins; to the oreat num- 
ber of homeless families, made destitude by the same tor- 
nado that razed the churches. In the meantime other 
churches more fortunate, have been tendered the stricken 
conscreorations in which to hold religious services tem- 
porarily. 

The following Sunday the various Catholic parishes 
bereft of relisjious homes were invited to masses in St. 




167 




168 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 1G9 

Vincent de Paul's Church, Ninth street and Park avenue, 
whose auditorium suffered but little injury. Its environs, 
however, and some of its ^'frills" were badly wrecked. 
Mass was celebrated hourly from 5 to 11 in the morning. 

The Lafayette Park Baptist congregation held services 
in the German Y. M. C. A. Hall, 1800 South Tenth 
street. The Lafayette Park Methodist congregation w^or- 
shiped in a large tent on the church lawn, facing Park 
avenue. The Presbyterian Church, just around the 
corner, w^orshiped in the basement of their damaged 
church and The Church of the Unity congregation met in 
its Sunday-school room. The McCausland Avenue Pres- 
byterian people held their meetings in the Grace Chapel, 
at Goodfellow and Theodosia avenues. 

The German congregations were invited to unite with 
other German churches most convenient for them to 
attend. Other homeless congregations were similarly 
provided for by churches of their respective denomina- 
tions. 

A QUARTER OF A MILLION. 

One corporation lost $288,000 by the storm, of whicli 
only $45,000 was protected by cyclone insurance. This 
was the United Elevator Company, organized in 1889, 
with a capital of $2,085,000, and a bonded indebted- 
ness of $1,215,000. In May, 1895, a shortage of wheat 
was discovered in the stock in the elevators. This 
amounted to $250, 000 bushels of wheat and entailed a 
loss of $150,000 to $200,000, the exact figures not being 
obtainable. In the summer of 1895 it was discovered 



170 - Ttlfi GREAT ClXLONT!. 

that a large amount of the corn in stock had heated, and 
this entailed a further loss of $125,000. In order to 
meet these losses and to provide money for operating 
expenses it was necessary to place a blanket mortgage of 
$485,000 on the property. 

The business during the winter was disappointing. 
The wheat crop of 1895 was a failure in the territory 
contiguous to St. Louis. The corn crop of 1895 was 
diverted from this city, being shipped by rail to Galves- 
ton and New Orleans for export. The result has been 
that for 12 months past the elevators have had practi- 
cally no business and were operated at a great loss. 

A month ago a movement was set on foot to fund two 
years' coupons on the first and second mortgage bonds 
for ^ve years. All the bondholders were not agreed to 
this. A majority were. Several large bondholders, 
notably Messrs Kehlor and Haarstick, would not agree 
to the scheme unless $25,000 was expended on the East 
St. Louis Elevators to put it in repair. 

STRUCK BY THE TORNADO. 

The matter was still under consideration when the tor- 
nado struck the city and forever sealed the doom of the 
St. Louis United Elevator Company. Every elevator in 
the system was damaged by the storm save the one at 
Venice, 111. 

Unfortunate as the com])any -has been it Avas the most 
unfortunate as to the loss of any corporation in the city. 
Its individual loss is the greatest in the city. The wind 
wrecked its elevators and its prospects at the same time. 



II 



TlIFi GR^AT CYCLONE. iVl 

The total loss on its property is given at 1288,000. On 

this it had but $45, 000 of tornado insurance, leaving a 

loss of $243, 000 above insurance. The loss is divided 

among the elevators as follows: 

Valley (totally destroyed) $130,000 

St. Louis (partially destroyed) 25,000 

Merchants' (partially destroyed) 10,000 

East St. Louis (partially destroyed) 15,000 

Advance (partially destroyed) 30,000 

Union (partially destroyed) 25.000 

Central A (partially destroyed) 5,000 

Union Depot (partially destroyed) 8,000 

Total $288,000 

AN APPALLING LOSS. 

This loss to the company is appalling. It is already 
bonded for $1,700,000. This is as much as the proper- 
ties are considered to be worth, although the capital stock 
is $2,685,000. It would cost $1,250,000 to rebuild the 
elevators entire, but most of them are old, and two -thirds 
of that amount would represent the value of the buildings 
before the storm. Of the bonds $1,215,000 are firsts and 
$485,000 seconds. 

It is doubtful if the Valley or Advance elevators will 
admit of repairs or even reconstruction. This being the 
case and the management, finding that it had not enough 
funds on hand to care for the grain in store, to say noth- 
ing of the repairs to the damaged property, at once 
notified all holders of grain in its houses that they must 
make provisions for the care of the grain as the elevator 
company was unable to do so. This condition of affairs, 
together with the fact that $4, 110 interest was due on the 



172 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

second mortgage bonds, $14,550 on the second mortgage 
bonds just after the storm, $22,665 on first mortgage 
bonds July 1, and $5,400 August 1, made a receiv^e'rship 
inevitable. Two days after the storm the C. B. &> Q. 
Railway Company, which owns 1,900 shares of stock, 
$97,500 in first mortgage l)onds and $35,000 in second 
mortgage bonds, with H. P. Tansey, who also is a stock- 
holder and bond owner, applied for a receiver. As both 
are non-residents of Missouri they filed their petition in 
the United States Court. Judge Adams heard the matter 
in chambers, granted the petition and appointed ex-Gov- 
ernor D. R. Francis receiver. 

DAMAGE EAST OF BROADWAY. 

The steel structure that supports the tracks of the Ter- 
minal Association acted as a sort of protector to the fronts 
of the buildings that face the river from Washington ave- 
nue to Poplar street. It served, also, as a convenient 
rack for the hurricane to hang sundry and divers articles, 
brought over from Illinois, upon. These varied from a 
tattered shirt, which waved in the wind at the foot of Lo- 
cust street, to a heavy beam weighing several hundred 
pounds, which had to be removed from the tracks be- 
fore travel could proceed. 

Most of the houses along this locality are very old and 
it is a wonder that more were not destroyed. They are 
mostly occupied ])y levee saloons and chandler stores on 
the ground floors and the upper stories are given over to 
cheap lodging and tenement houses. To the occupants 
of those houses it was a night of terror. 




173 




174 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 175 

After the fury of the storm had passed, their fear re- 
fused to be allayed and they huddled in groups until the 
day broke. Many were afraid to remain in the houses 
lest there should be a repetition of the violent wind and 
spent the night wandering along the levee front. With 
daylight, however, their courage returned and they 
thronged the levee laughing and discussing the events of 
the night as if nothing had occurred to upset their equi- 
librium, and morbidly curious, now that the danger was 
past, to gain all the gruesome details of the disaster. 
Here and there could be seen the tear-stained counte- 
nance of one who had lost a dear one in the course of the 
night's horrible events; but the majority of that motley 
crowd seemed unconcerned and even gay. 

The cyclone that caused the damage along the river 
front evidently crossed the riv^er diagonally from the 
northv/est. Its violence is noticeable all the way from 
Washington avenue to Lesperance street, where it seems 
to have veered westward. Along this entire distance the 
levee is thickly strewn with rubbish and debris. The 
wind was so violent that the waters of the Mississippi 
were at numerous places carried up into the lower stories 
of the houses fronting on the river. The steel posts that 
support the terminal tracks show marks that insure that 
the water must have flowed several feet deep over por- 
tions of the levee that are dry this morning. 

A number of sheds were stand ino; near the elevator. 
In one of them was a horse and buggy belonging to an 
employe. Neither shed, horse nor buggy has been seen 
since the storm. All have completely disappeared, leaving 



176 THE GREAT rY(TX)NE. 

not a trace. The body of a horse, destitute of harness, 
was found half a mile souththe following morning, but has 
not been identified as the one carried from the elevator 
yard. 

As an illustration of the freaks played by the wind, a 
large wagon loaded with lumber, which an ordinary gust 
would be sufficient to overturn, was left standing in the 
yard uninjured, while the horses hitched to it were torn 
loose and whisked away. 

The sides of the elevator were covered with heavy iron 
sheeting, strongly bolted to the beams. All this was 
stripped off as cleanly as if done by human hands. The 
lofty brick chimney withstood the wind's assault un- 
scathed. 

The large buildings occupied by the Campbell Glass 
and Paint Company and the Geo. P. Phmt Milling Com- 
pany were also badly damaged. It is impossible at this 
time to estimate the damao^f* in dollars and cents. 

A PAXIC AMONG FACTORY GIRLS. 

The factory of the Bemis Bros. Bag Co., at the foot of 
Poplar street, had one side completely blown out. Sev- 
eral hundred girls who work there were panic stricken and 
rushed in all directions. Quite a number are believed to 
have been injured by flying timbers. The next morning 
the girls assembled about the factory in droves and dis- 
cussed innumerable hair-breadth escapes they had experi-- 
enced. Then they went sight-seeing with evident enjoy- 
ment, regardless of the fact that they will be thrown out 
of employment. j 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 177 

The na\'al store and department of the Waters -Pierce 
Oil Company was completely destroyed. Malachy Mc- 
Donald, the superintendent, was struck by a piece of fall- 
ing roof and instantly killed. The other employes es- 
caped with cuts and bruises. Bob Newman, an employe 
of the company, is congratulating himself on his good 
fortune. He left his office about a quarter to 5 o'clock, 
and had just reached Broadway and Olive street when the 
storm broke. The next morning he found his office a 
mass of ruins. McDonald was killed within a few feet 
of it. 

devastation's aavful triumph. 

At Levee and Pine street seemed to mark the northern 
limit of the real hurricane. At that point several build- 
ings were partially wrecked. Commercial street between 
Pine and Chestnut was so obstructed by debris as to be 
almost impassable. Along this block almost every house 
was unroofed and two or three of tlie taller ones have 
lost the upper stories. The building occupied by the 
St. Louis Commission Company was entirely wrecked 
and its contents scattered over the neighborhood. Sacks 
of wool were carried blocks away. 

At the Levee and Market street several small buildings 
were demolished. They were occupied by families, most 
of the inhabitants being more or less injured. The rear 
of the large factory of the Bridge Beach Company was 
wrecked, the roof and two upper stories being carried 
away. 

Devastation on every side greeted the eye of a person 



178 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

walking south on the Levee, but not until Poplar street 
was passed could the full violence of the storm be appre- 
ciated. Between there and Carroll street there was not a 
whole house standing. At the foot of Cedar street a 
two story building was completely razed to the ground. 
There is doubt as to whether it was occupied or not. 
People living in the neighborhood say that it had no reg- 
ular inhabitants, but almost every night a number of ref- 
ugees sought shelter there. 

The immense Nedderhut warehouse was partially 
wrecked, but no one is thought to have been killed there. 

The wind played havoc in the Iron Mountain yards. 
Freight cars were blown about like they were baby car- 
riages, overturned and wrecked. AVhole lines of cars 
are so covered with debris as to be almost invisible. A 
dozen sheds and small buildings that served various pur- 
poses about the yards have completely disappeared. The 
main building is shattered, but still stands. The most 
appalling sight along the demolished river front was the 
wreck of the United Elevator at the foot of Chouteau 
avenue. This immense structure offered a fair mark for 
the cyclone, and besides lay almost directly in the center 
of its path. From the main building the four upper 
stories were torn. So clean was the wind's work that at 
a distance it looked as if they might have been sawed off. 
For hundreds of feet on every side masses of broken and 
splintered lumber were strewn in a way to make approach 
difficult. The river house was also demolished and the 
network of trams that connected it with the elevator 
proper obliterated. 1 







^: 



''M lf{j . . i ///_^ 



i^P^i/r- 




1--^ i> 




J79 




J80 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 181 

Half a dozen rushed into the office, a little frame 
shanty on the north side of the elevator. Although it 
was the frailest structure of the lot it was the only one 
that remained intact. The terror-stricken men barred 
the door and then clung to each other in momentary ap- 
prehension of a terrible death. Timbers and flying arti- 
cles of all kinds dashed against the shanty and smashed 
the windows, but fortunate none of the men were struck. 
Several times it seemed like the house would be carried 
away intact, but an immense safe acted as an anchor and 
held it down. C. E. Allen, the day watchman, started 
to run across to the river house, but his companions saw 
a piece of flying timber, strike him and he was buried in 
the ruins of falling buildings. Quite a number of men 
and boys were observed to be fishing from the river house 
just before the storm, and are supposed to be buried or 
to have been washed away by the waves. 

STATION TORN UP. 

The small station at the junction of King's highway 
and the Oak Hill railroad was completely torn up and 
thrown to the ground. The station master, Pat Higgins, 
was in the buildins; at the time and was buried beneath 
the debris. By the prompt assistance of witnesses of the 
disaster he was finally extricated. His head was badly 
cut and he w^as bruised all over his body. His injuries 
are not serious. 

The storm did much damage to Charles Shewer's saloon 
at King's highway and New Manchester road. The stable 
was unroofed and the horses narrowly escaped being killed. 



182 THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 

Mrs. Bredemeyer furnished oue of the few humorous 
gleams across the dark tale of suffering and disaster which 
the storm has left in its wake. Mrs. Bredemeyer went 
out to the cow shed to get some bran for her cow's sup- 
per. She did not find the cow shed and it was not until 
she had gone around like Diogenes wdth a lantern that 
she discovered the shed up in her attic. She did not at- 
tempt to explain the trick the wind had played upon her. 

IN NORTH ST. LOCIS. | 

At Broadway and Carr street the roof of a three-story 
brick building containing stores and flats blew off, a large 
section of the roof striking grip car No. 4 of the Broad- 
way cable. Tlie car w^as wrecked, the passengers escap- 
ing with slight injuries. A portion of the same roof fell 
upon the Rialto Livery Stable on Carr street, burying two f 
of the stable employes and several horses. The men 
were taken out uninjured. 

The Niedringhaus Memorial Hall, at Seventh and Cass 
avenue, was unroofed and considerable damage done the 
library and other contents of the building. 

The roofs of two of the buildings of the St. Louis Stamp- 
ing Company, at Second and Collins streets, were torn off • 
and eight large smoke stacks blown down. 

The driver of a bakery wagon belonging to B. Colom- 
bauo,1411 Pine street, was probably fatally hurt while 
passing the corner of Sixth and Carr streets. The wagon 
was completely demolished by a falling wall, and the 
driver removed to the City Hospital with a broken leg 
and serious wounds about the head. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 183 

The wall of B. Tegetoff's saloon, at Seventh and O'Fal- 
lon streets, fell on a Cass avenue motor car, No. 55, and 
a number of passengers were hurt, none seriously. 

The steeple of St. Patrick's Church, Sixth and Biddle 
streets, was blown down and the adjoining residence of 
Father McCaffrey unroofed. A squad of police from the 
Third District Station procured tarpaulins and covered 
the furnishings of the residence before great damage was 
done. The roof of the parochial school was also blown 
off. Gilbert Chapman's cigar store, at tlie bridge en- 
trance. Third and Washington avenue, was completely 
leveled. The proprietor and five unknown men in the 
building escaped injury. It was a small structure, val- 
ued at about $600. 

PANIC AT THE KACES. 

At the Fair Grounds races, 3000 persons received a 
fright that they will not soon recover from. The roof 
of the grand stand was blown off and completely demol- 
ished, a portion of it striking a horse hitched to a milk 
waojon on the Natural Brido^e road. The horse was killed 
instantly. No lives were lost, and that such is the fact 
is indeed miraculous. The rain probably saved many 
persons from being crushed to death by falling portions 
of the room. Whenever the visitors at the Fair Grounds 
are overtaken by a heavy rain all hands either seek the 
basement or betting ring as places for shelter. When the 
storm broke the portion of the crowd not in the betting 
ring at once turned down into the basement. There they 
escaped being injured. 



184 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

The crashing of the roof on the ground was like the 
explosion of a hundred cannons and together with the 
thunder and lightning sent fear to the hearts of every 
person on the grounds. Every one thought of the cyclone 
and its terrible ravages and pandemonium reigned for 
fully fifteen minutes. Women became hysterical and ran 
around the basement like mad while strong men were 
terror-stricken and speechless. Only the presence of 
mind of a few kept the crowd from surging out of the 
doors leading to the north walk, where certain death from 
flying timbers awaited them. 

In the betting ring, where many speculators were in 
line trying to cash on the fifth race, which had just been 
run, and others waiting for the odds to be posted on the 
sixth event, the greatest confusion prevailed when the 
storm lashed forth in all its fury. The betting shed stood 
well the test of the wind and the only damage done was 
the blowing away of the awnings that surrounded the 
affair. As the wind continued to blow, several hundred 
persons who fancied that it was only a matter of a few 
moments when every building on the grounds would be 
razed to the earth, ran as fast as their legs would carry 
them across the track to the center field. There tliey 
stood amid the thunder and lightning watching the wind 
spend its fury. 

Following the wind and electric storms the rain came 
down in torrents. The people in the field were soon 
drenched to the skin and with feelings of the man who 
jumped into the river with all his clothes on. 

A horse and buggy belonging to the Sano Chemical 




185 




RESIDENCE ON PARK AVE. 



186 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 187 

Company was standing on the north road when the storm 
broke loose. A large portion of the roof fell down upon 
them, and not a person who saw the horse struck believed 
he was alive. When the storm had subsided scores of 
willino; hands were at work with axes and hatchets at- 
tempting to extricate the animal from the debris he was 
under. After fifteen minutes' hard labor the roof was 
raised, and the horse pulled out from his position — alive, 
and not a scratch on him. This is an illustration of the 
many miraculous escapes that both human beings and an- 
imals had in the course of the afternoon. The force with 
which the falling portions of the roof struck the ground 
was something tremendous, as evidenced by the split tel- 
egraph poles which happened to be struck on the Natural 
Bridge road. The storm put an end to the cashing of 
winning tickets on the fifth race, for speculators and 
bookmakers flew in all directions. Many made their es- 
cape to the hedge along the outside fence, where they sat 
down in the mud and slush awaiting their fate. 

No further damage was done at the fair grounds other 
than the blowing down of a number of trees. The Fair 
Association will sustain a loss of about $1,500. Secre- 
tary Aull stated that it would cost no more than that 
amount to put on a new roof to the grand stand. A 
wrecking company was pat to work next morning and 
the debris speedily removed. Racing was continued the 
next day, only the lower part of the grand stand being 
used by the visitors. 



188 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

RESCUED FROM A WRECKED SALOON BUILDING. 

The great Cupples buildings withstood the storm well, 
but hundreds of dollars' worth of plate glasa was de- 
stroyed. All the windows in the south and eastern ends of 
the buildings were blown in and the upper floors flooded 
with the heavy rain. Much of the goods stored near the 
windows were damaged by the rain. No one was injured. 
Across the street, the small frame and brick buildings suf- 
fered. Nearly all of them were unroofed and many of them 
had their second stories blown in. Tlie saloon of Peter 
Nalty, at 614 South Seventh street, was completely 
demolished. Nalty, his wife and nine customers were 
buried in the debris. All of them were rescued alive and 
sent to the Dispensary for treatment. Nalty lived over 
the saloon, and lost not only his business, but his home 
and its furnishings as well. Curley's lodging-house, at 
628 South Seventh street, was demolished, but all 
the occupants escaped and most of them helped dig 
out the unfortunates buried in the wreck of Nalty's 
saloon. 

The Missouri Pacific headquarters building was badly 
damaged, and the freight sheds at Seventh and Valentine 
streets were completely unroofed. The street was filled 
with broken wires and poles from Market street south, 
so that travel was almost impossible. 

The large furniture store of Wm. Ottenad, at Soulard 
and Broadway, was completely destroyed. Ottenad, his 
wife and a clerk and a driver were buried in the wreck, 
which is possibly the most complete one in the city. The 
building was a four-story one and nothing but a heap of 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. - 180 

broken timber and dismantled stone and brick marks the 
spot. 

The Soulard Market building was unroofed and a por- 
tion of the building was blown down. The old St. Vin- 
cent's Insane Asylum was unroofed and flooded and the 
great brick wall was blown down. All along Lafayette 
avenue houses were unroofed and moved from their 
foundations. The streets were filled with trees and 
broken wires. 



DOWNTOWN WRECKS. 

The feed store of Arnold Fuehs, at Ninth and Clark 
avenue, was almost demolished, the roof and front of the 
western portion having been blown away. 

Morrissey's saloon, on Eleventh and Clark avenue, had 
the front and eastern w^alls blown out. A two-story 
frame house and a brick carpenter shop adjoining it on 
the east were literally wiped out of existence, and the con- 
tents of Heinrichshofen &, Lawrence's lumber yard, on 
Tenth and Clark avenue, were scattered as far east as 
Seventh street. 

Enno Sanders' bottling factory, on Eleventh, near Wal- 
nut street, was almost totally demolished, the northern 
front portion, together with the roof, going by the board. 

The roof of the Sumner High School, on Eleventh and 
Spruce streets, took a vacation, joining the debris from 
the roof and walls of the jail, which blew out onto Spruce 



190 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

street. The roof of Tom McDermott's saloon, on 
Eleventh and Chestnut streets, fell off and tried to get 
into the front door. 

All the windows in the front of the Hagan Theater 
were blown out and a portion of the roof demolished. 

The heavy iron roof of the Merchants' Exchange build- 
ing was lifted off in three sections and deposited on Third 
and Chestnut streets. A portion of it caught on the wires 
on Chestnut street, where it hung down like a huge tar- 
paulin. 

The roof and upper front wall of the '*Amerika"buihl- 
ing, opposite .the Exchange building, was blown down 
into Third street. 

Perhaps the most unique freak played by the wind 
was observed on the tower of the McLean building ou 
Fourth and Market streets. The observatory of the tower 
was filled with chairs, signs, awnings and other debris 
that had been caught up by the wind from the street, or 
blown out of adjacent offices and whirled up a distance 
of eighty feet in the air, cathing on the projections of 
the tower, where they remained, a most practical illus- 
tration of the fantastic power of the tornado. 

The entire roof of the mammoth warehouse of Martin 
Lanmert, on Second and Walnut streets, was uplifted 
and scattered over several acres of the vicinity. 

On Sixth and Chestnut streets the wind caught a heavy 
four-horse truck and blew it 100 feet up the street with- 
out overturning it. 

At the stables of the American Express Company, on 
Eleventh and Walnut streets^ half a dozen of the heavy 




101 



WRECKED HOM^ ON OREGON AV^, 




^AMI'Ll; Ol'* TH14 STORM'S RAGI? ON TARK AVIi. 



182 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 193 

express wagons were overturned by the wind like so many 
toy carts. 

On Fourth and Market streets, within a space of 200 
feet, no less than fourteen overturned wagons were 
counted during the height of the storm. Four horses 
were blown out of the harness that attached them to the 
vehicles, and all found refuge in a butcher shop. 

On Twelfth and Clark avenue an unknown individual 
deserted the horse and buggy he was driving. The wind 
struck the rig, whirled it around three or four times and 
blew the buggy clear of the horse, carrying it up Clark 
avenue to Eighteenth street, where it was demolished. 
The horse was blown up against a telegraph pole and 
stunned. 

A man who was standing in front of Hoefner's saloon, 
on Twelfth and Clark avenue, was caught up by the wind 
and carried through the glass door. 

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE UNROOFED. 

The roof of the Merchants' Exchange was ripped from 
the fastenings and whipped about like a rag in the wind. 
Great sheets of tin were hurled up in the air and twisted 
into shapeless masses. There was not a square foot of 
the roof left smooth and when the storm was over the 
roofing was lying on the four streets surrounding the 
building. 

A piece of the roof, 50 feet long, on the Pine street 
side, was lifted high up in the air and then carried down- 
wards towards White's restaurant, on the north side. 
The strings of wires running up the street were all that 

13 



194 THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 

saved the building, for one end of the sheet caught on 
the wires and it hung downward, reaching to the granite. 
While this was going on the same scene was being 
enacted on Chestnut street. Two pieces of the roof flew 
like handkerchiefs across the narrow thoroughfare, and 
again the wires saved the building. One hung down in 
front of the Booth Packing Company's store and the 
other rested on its center on the top of a telephone pole 
in front of the American Tent and Awning Company. 
These sw^uns; to and fro in the wind and threatened to 
fall at every moment. 

On Third street the surface was strewn with brick, 
bits of roofing, cornice and wire. A large piece of the 
cornice was toi'n from the gable over the main entrance 
and struck one of the ornamental lamp posts near the 
steps. The iron post snapped like a reed and fell with 
the other debris. Some of the sheet metal roofing was 
blown as far as Olive street and was tangled with fallen 
wires. 

The interior of the building presented a scene of utter 
desolation. The protecting roof being gone the rain came 
through the plastered ceiling in a perfect deluge, and the 
water on the floor was ankle deep. . Throughout the 
entire structure the water poured as though no covering 
was over it at all. Every office from the cellar up was 
thoroughly drenched, and an umbrella was necessary 
while walkino: throuirh them. 

luthe main hall workmen were busy all night sweeping 
out the water, but it was like trying to keep back the sea 
with a broom. There Avere no electric or gas lights in the 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 195 

place, aad a hundred candles, with sample pans for impro- 
vised candlesticks, were stuck around to give light for the 
workers. The water simply rained in through the plas- 
tering, and the magnificent paintings on the ceiling were 
utterly ruined. So soaked was the plastering that it 
threatened to fall at any moment and bury the laborers 
who were sweeping the water out, but they worked all 
unmindful of their danger. 

The pit was indeed pitiful. Water stood a foot deep 
in the ring, and reached above the lower step. 

In the basement is an office which was kept busy all 
night. It is the supply department of the Bell Telephone 
Company, and the linemen were in and out at every mo- 
ment, getting material to repair the damage to the wires. 
They, too, had to wade in water, and the clerks sat on 
high stools to issue the supplies. 

SKYSCRAPERS ESCAPED. 

It has been said that a lofty office building is danger- 
ous in a storm. This did not prove the case with the St. 
Louis high buildings. In not a single instance was the 
slightest damage done to one of them, and tenants in the 
top stories felt no more, inconvenience during the passage 
of the storm than if they had been on the first floor of a 
one -story structure. 

A report was circulated and even telegraphed to other 
cities that the roof of the Rialto building, a ten- story of- 
fice building, was blown away. The Rialto sustained no 
damage. 

At the Union Trust building no damage was done and 



196 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the building did not even sway during the height of the 
storm. 

The half finished Chemical building was open to the 
elements, none of the windows being in, but the damage 
to it did not amount to 110. 

Other big buildings that went through without loss 
were the Commercial, the Laclede, the Columbia, the 
New Century, the Odd Fellows, the Security, the Bur- 
lington and others. 

All of these dwellings are of what is known as steel 
construction. They are built with interlaced and riveted 
steel beams and joists, and are as solid as rock. 

Their roofs, the portion of the building that would be 
expected to suffer in a wind storm, are as safe as the body 
of the building, as they are part of it, being built with 
it. To blow off the roof would mean to break the inter- 
locking of the entire structure and great damage would 
result. 

In the construction of these skeleton buildings the ar- 
chitects made specific calculations for resistance to a wind 
having a velocity of from seventy to ninety miles per 
hour. 

The effect of a tornado on a tall steel skeleton building 
has never been tested until the present time. Since the 
construction of these buildings was begun in large cities 
a severe storm has never visited any of them. 

AT THE COURT-HOUSE. 

The storm struck the Court House at 5:05. The office 
usually closes at 5 o'clock, but two suits came in then and 




•mm' ,« 



197 




198 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 199 

the filing took about five minutes. While the reporters 
were reading the papers the storm broke. For two or 
three minutes the electric lights had faded and revived 
and then faded again, and this indicated an unusual 
electrical disturbance, and finally expired altogether. 
Then the storm fell in its fury. Windows in the dome 
were ripped out, and gusts of wind shrieked through the 
structure and made dismal howls. The crash of falling 
glass was followed by flooding rain. Then the wind 
swooped down with a final supreme effort, but no further 
damage was done the old building. 

Every electric light in the building was extinguished. 
This would have been disastrous for the Fire Alarm Tel- 
egraph Service but for the fact that the office had kept 
its gas in commission in anticipation of such an emergency. 

AT THE CUSTOM HOUSE. 

Several hundred dollars damage was done the Federal 
Building, the bulk of it in the Weather Bureau. It 
rained through the roof up in the tower just about as hard 
as it rained on the outside aud nearly ever window in the 
observatory was broken. For a time Observer Franken- 
field was apprehensive that his valuable instruments would 
be damaged; indeed, it looked, when the storm was at its 
height, as though the entire tower and all its contents 
would take a sail over the roof of the Chemical Building. 

SCENES AT THE HOTELS. 

The Planters' Hotel lost several hundred panes of glass. 
The most damage was to the eleventh story, occupied by 



200 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the help. The night force were, for the most part, asleep 
when the storm came on. Some were awakened by the 
crashing of their windows, and others by the rain that 
blew and poured in on them. Two or three slept through 
it all. Every room on the west side of the top story was 
damaged and a number also on the opposite side. Inside 
transoms were blown in as well as outside windows. Two 
or three of the girls were cut with glass, but nobody was 
seriously hurt. The damage on the floors below was 
mostly done by rain that poured in through windows left 
open. The glass was, except in a few cases, sufficiently 
thick to resist the wind. On every floor two or three 
windows were blown in. The rest withstood the force of 
the storm. Where windows had been left open carpets, 
bedding, and in a few instances the clothing of guests 
were soaked. Several transoms on the opposite side of 
the room, connecting with the hallway were smashed by 
the wind that blew through the room. Many of the girls 
employed at the hotel, and some of the men, too, thought 
their last hour had come. One man in the laundry is re- 
ported to have fainted from fright. Considerable excite- 
ment prevailed also among the guests. The parlor floor 
and corridors on the office floor were thronged during the 
storm. 

The ladies' ordinary at the Southern Hotel and the 
kitchen were badly damaged. Several holes were torn in 
the roof over the ordinary, letting the rain pour in in tor- 
rents. The kitchen range was partially demolished, and 
the skylight overhead wrecked. Hot meals were sus- 
pended for dinner at the Southern that night. The chef 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 201 

was cut in the head and back with glass, and four others 
were injured. Dr. Powers, the hotel physician and sur- 
geon, was kept busy nearly an hour patching up wounds. 
One of the injured was a woman, the others being men. 
The skylight in the roof of the hotel over the rotunda 
was damaged enough to flood the floor of the rotunda. 
Manager Lewis was one of the busiest men in St. Louis 
durino; and for several hours after the storm. No hotel 
of magnitude was seriously injured, and the new Conven- 
tion Auditorium was so slightly damaged that it was re- 
paired in three days. Fortunately it was just outside the 
storm area proper. 

DANGER AT THE .TAIL. 

At the Four Courts the most fearful excitement pre- 
vailed. The woman's corner of the jail was blown down 
and bedlam turned loose. The first known of the storm 
was the violent shaking of the building, which is one of 
the strongest and safest institutions in the city. The 
wind played havoc with the windows. Crash after 
crash would bring down showers of glass. The court 
was just about closed, when several bricks from the roofs 
of a neighboring building came flying through the 
window. The women among the witnesses screamed, and 
burly men pushed and trampled their inferiors under 
their feet. The mob was so excited that the clerks 
voice could not be heard as he cried out for the people to 
take their time. But it was useless, as the crowd sur- 
ged forward and out of the doors. Luckily, no one was 
seriously injured. 



'202 THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 

A terrible whistling noise, followed by a series of 
frightful screams, came out of the jail. The prisoners, 
penned in the cells, cried to be let out. 

Deputy Sheriff Wagner ran into the bull ring and 
ordered silence, but they cursed him and kicked against 
the door. A hurried conclave was held, and it was de- 
cided to let them out. About fifteen cells were opened,, 
and the piisoners flocked out. Other cells were being 
opened, when a terrific crash of thunder came. 

Again the prisoners who were still confined screamed I 
to be released, and the lucky ones who were already out | 
gathered around the winding stairway where the guards 
were assembled. Asjain and asjain the lio-htninoj flashed, 
and with a horrible crash the corner of the women's 
division of the building gave way. Then from the in- 
terior of the jail came shriek after shriek. The prisoners 
ran up and down the winding stairs and tried to force 
the guards to let them out, vowing that they wH)uld make 
no eifort to escape. 

They became so wildly excited that Deputy Jailer Wag- 
ner ordered them again locked up in their cells. To this 
they objected, and stood the guards off. The riot bell 
was sounded, and in a minute a score of detectives and 
policemen ran into the jail. They tried to force the pris- 
oners back, but it was useless. Then the oflicers drew 
their revolvers, and with clubs lifted aloft threatened to 
kill the men if they did not return to their cells. This 
frightened them, and they went back to their cells. Then 
a dozen officers w^ere stationed at the corner of the build- 
ing, which was blown down, to prevent the men from es.- 




203 



— 1 -r- TT- 1 '- r' 










204 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 205 

caping. A milk-white pigeon fell down from the roof on 
the bricks below. 

The top of the building suffered the worst. It shook 
so that the building fairly rocked. Matron Harris, who 
is on the fourth floor, came running down, frightened 
half to death. She was taken into Chief Desmond's 
office, which escaped the storm's wrath. In Chief Harri- 
gan's office two window frames were blown into the room 
and the carpet was soaked with water. They were picked 
up by the wind and carried into the middle of the street. 
A man driving a butcher wagon attempted to drive down 
Clark avenue, but his horse took fright and upset the 
wagon. He was caught by the wagon and dragged about 
25 feet. Some men who were standing in the doorway 
ran and picked him up and carried him downstairs. He 
was stripped of all his clothing and was bleeding from 
every part of his body. 

HEARTBREAKING^ SPECTACLE. 

The scene at the Morgue all night long defies descrip- 
tion. All through the darkness, and in the daylight 
which followed, bodies were brought there. The usual 
marble slabs were displaced by pine coffins, as requiring 
less space. 

The bodies were stretched upon boxes, and before long 
every inch of space except a narrow passageway was 
occupied. 

The crowd in front of the Morgue increased constantly 
until it blocked the sidewalk and extended into the street. 
It w'as a weeping and wailing concourse. Pitiful tales 



206 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

were told by mothers of their missing children, by wives 
of husbands who had failed to return home. 

The people were necessarily shut out from their dead. 
Had all who sought admission been granted it the Morgue 
would have been filled to overflowing and the proper dis- 
^ position of the bodies that were arriving, almost con- 
stantly, impossible. 

The crowd, which was almost a mob, surged and 
groaned with the horror discernible through the glass 
partition. Bodies of men and women, many battered 
beyond recognition, met the gaze of those fortunate 
enough to reach the glass screen. 

Some idea of it was passed to those behind by the ex- 
clamations from those in front. 

At 9 o'clock the crowd in front of the Morgue was so 
dense that additional policemen were necessary to pre- 
serve order. To permit traffic the crowd was forced off 
the pavement and kept lined up at the curbstone, with a 
passageway left in the middle of the street for dead 
tvagons. 

There were constant appeals from frantic people for 
admission. Some were stolid in their grief, others gave 
vent to most heartrending outcries. 

For the few who recognized their loved ones in the 
array of mutilated dead hundreds were left in suspense by 
failure to find those for whom they were searching. The 
number of missing in St. Louis on Thursday must almost 
equal the number of dead, for the proportion of missing 
reported at the Morgue during the morning is necessarily 
small. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 207 

While the attaches of the Morgue were busy with a body, 
a woman almost crazed with grief burst through the Super- 
intendent's offtce and into the room of the dead. Her cries 
resounded throutrh tliecliarnel house as she called aloud : 

" O, my sister, my sister ! " 

It was impossible to quiet the fi'antic woman. She 
rushed, as one distracted, from body to body. Her sister 
was not there. She was not satisfied. She continued to 
cry out in her grief. When finally quieted she said that 
her sister's name was Ida Sieger and she lived on Sidney 
street, near Twelfth street. Her condition was such that 
she could give no further information. 

Fifteen minutes before three women, scarcely less fran- 
tic, had appeared searching for three young girls who left 
home before the tornado Wednesday afternoon and had 
not returned. They had started for a physician's office 
on South Broadway. They were Lena Lange, Edna 
Wetzel and Olga Wehrfritz, all living at 2906^ Olive 
street. One of the women was the mother of Edna Wet- 
zel. They were so overcome with grief that it was with 
difficulty they made any statement. 

BRINGING IN THE DEAD. 

Momentarily the gong of an approaching dead wagon 
would cause the crowd to part. The trips of the wagons 
with their mutilated human freight became more and 
more frequent. 

There had been a slight lull shortly after daylight, 
until the searchers at work in the path the cyclone had 
marked could reach the victims of its fury. 



208 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

As the work progressed the wagons with the dead 
drove up to the Morgue almost in procession. Each new 
arrival was greeted with gasps of horror by the crowd. 

What had at first been a collection of bereaved and 
grief stricken men and women, had gradually grown to a 
mass of curiosity seekers. 

At one time the crowd almost took the Morgue by 
storm. Several men attempted to force their way into 
the office of Superintendent Mack, but were pushed back 
and the door barred. The police had difficulty in con- 
trolling the almost frantic mass. 

Those who were seeking their dead were admitted to 
the Morgue in twos and threes. Many obtained admis- 
sion under false pretenses. Some found their dead ; oth- 
ers left with sinking hearts, convinced that their missing 
were beneath ruins. 

Within 12 hours of the disaster there were 56 bodies 
in the Morgue, many of them still unidentified. 




309 



!4 




^^^^Jl 



210 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 211 



IN EAST ST. LOUIS. 



The tornado that wrought such havoc in St. Louis 
jumped the Mississippi and wrecked the western half of 
East St. Louis. More than 100 people were killed and 
three times that number injured. Two million dollars 
will not cover the damage done to property. The dam- 
age was done in a few minutes' time, and how any person 
in the path of the cyclone escaped is a mystery to all who 
passed over the devastated section. The wind struck the 
levee just north of the East St. Louis elevator, about 
5:30. The wharf of the Wiggins Ferry was the first to 
suffer, and it was thrown far up on the levee. 

Eye witnesses of the scene in East St. Louis describe it as 
the most terrible ever witnessed. Whole roofs of houses 
were flying through the air. Trees were uprooted, and 
every movable object was endowed with the power of lo- 
comotion by the hurricane. Those who possessed suffi- 
cient courage to look from their windows saw a mass of 
opaque air, which seemed to be whirling around in a cir- 
cle and possessed of no definite object except to destroy 
as much property and take away as many lives as possi- 
ble. When the sharp clap of thunder^ immediately pre- 
ceding the fiercest part of the storm, reverberated 
throughout the city, there were many who thought it was 
the crack of doom. They sought refuge in prayer and 
by hiding themselves in their closets. Still the wind 
blowed. Every gust seemed to gain encouragement from 
the one which preceded it. It was no respecter of per- 
sons. Roofs of modest dwellings and those of factories 



212 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

and apparently solid structures were blown away. It 
lasted perhaps fifteen minutes, but time is merely a meas- 
ure of events and so many things happened in that short 
interval that there were many terror-stricken persons who 
believed the storm lasted for hours. 

When the clouds rolled away and a clearer atmos- 
phere enabled persons to see some distance from their 
homes the city bore an altered appearance. Many dwell- 
ing houses were splintered into kindling wood. Men and 
women ran hither and thither, calling aloud for surgeons 
and nurses to help them care for their dead and wounded. 
Mothers implored help to find their children. 
Husbands carried the mangled bodies of their 
wives out into the streets, where the cool 
rain seemed a balm that would mitigate their suffering. 
Comparative calm came as suddenly as the storm. The 
wind ceased to blow and for a time comparative cheerful- 
ness prevailed. AVhen, however, the awful destruction 
of the storm was realized a gloom spread over the town 
like a pall. 

PRAYED FOR MERCY. 

It was converted in those short twenty minutes into a 
city where lamentations and prayers for mercy were 
offered, even after the source of danger had gone. The 
work of rescue began as soon as the inhabitants, stupe- 
fied by terror, realized that they might be of service to 
others. The rooming-houses and hotels being in a down- 
town district were visited by the rescuers first. Nothing 
but the sight of mangled bodies and groans from those 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 213 

who were pinned down by timbers could enforce upon 
those who had escaped a comprehension of the terrible 
destructiveness of the storm. 

Residents of the stricken city gathered in little knots 
on the street. They did not mind the drenching rain. 
Nothing except the wind, which left death in its path, 
possessed any terrors for them. They saw that the entire 
east approach to the Eads bridge had been carried away 
by the wind as if it had been so much tissue paper. On 
every side ruins were to be seen. For a time chaos 
reigned. No one knew exactly what to do. 

The Court House and police headquarters had been 
blown away. Officers knew not where to find their cliief, 
and while vaguely conscious that they ought to do some- 
thing were at a loss how to proceed. In the c'ourse of 
time, however, temporary police headquarters were estab- 
lished. Drays and wagons were pressed into service 
as ambulances, and the work of rescuing the dying and 
removing the dead began. Several persons were found 
whose bodies had been transfixed by the sharp ends of 
huge timbers. Others lay moaning and groaning under 
the weight of a ton of timbers. Every courier that 
arrived at police headquarters had fresh tidings of calam- 
ity, until those who received the reports became inured to 
tales of terror, and received them as quietly as though they 
had been commonplace annals of every -day happenings. 
With the storm came a darkness that added to the terror. 

Residents of St. Louis, fearingfor the safely of friends 
and relatives and of property besieged the watchman who 
had been stationed at the bridge with requests to be al- 



214 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

lowed to cross. The passageway was filled with debris 
from the bridge overhead. The watchman had instruc- 
tions to allow no one to pass. Two trains which had 
been blown over by the storm blocked the way of pedes- 
trians. The burning buildings in East St. Louis cast a 
lurid glare over the rapidly rushing waters and the ruins 
of the town pictured in silhouette led many to believe the 
conflagration had destroyed the entire city. Those who 
did get over saw only a scene of wholesale destruction of 
life and property. East St. Louis and its ruins were one 
huge mausoleum, covering no one knew how many dead. 

SEARCHING FOR THE DEAD. 

The scene here was frightful, but it was nothing com- 
pared with the scene along the Levee, Broadway and the 
side streets of the Island. Every house had relatives 
and friends among the dead and injured. Husbands, 
fathers and brothers worked at night in the freight houses, 
on the boats and the cars, and as these could not be 
found the anguish of mothers, sisters and other relatives 
was heartrending. They would run from one tempor- 
ary morgue to another, and in some instances push aside 
dead bodies in order to attempt to identify their rela- 
tives, and, when found, the cries would melt a heart of 
stone. A mother would behold the distorted features of 
an only son, while at another place some other member 
would find a missing father, brother or daughter. 

A hotel's sad role. 

The Tuttle House, Third street, w^as like a hospital all 
night. In one room upstairs lay William Cogan, one of 




215 




216 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 217 

the best known members of the Brotherhood of Locomo- 
tive Engineers. He runs on the Baltimore and Ohio 
Southwestern, and was to have taken out the 3 o'clock 
fast mail train on that road. He was in a barber shop at 
Third street and Missouri avenue when the storm came 
up. The building was completely wrecked and the half 
dozen people inside buried out of sight. Mr. Cogan 
worked his way out without assistance, and did not think 
he had been seriously injured. He suffered intensely 
from pains in his back and sides. 

H. K, Vail, one of the boarders, had a broken arm in 
a sling. He was crossing the bridge when the storm 
came up. He hurried across and sheltered himself on 
the leeward side of the frame building, which blew^ over 
on him directly afterward. 

One room at the Tuttle House was occupied by three 
young ladies. Maggie Herbert, of Washington, Ind., had 
a broken arm. ''I was in the dining room of the Tre- 
mont House when the storm occurred," she said. "A 
portion of the roof blew off and half a dozen of us ran to 
get out of the way of flying timbers and bricks. We ran 
into the kitchen and back into the dining room, and 
finally the whole house fell in. Mrs. Hays, the land- 
lady, and two or three others were killed and the rest of 
us badly hurt." 

Miss Herbert's companions in the room were Florence 
Reilly, a telegraph operator, and Josie Gallen, a type- 
writer. Miss Reilly lives at 3672 Finney avenue, this 
city, and Miss Gallen at 3311 Chouteau avenue. They 
are both in the employ of the Illinois Central Railroad, 



218 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

and were at work in the company's freight office, on the 
Levee, when the storm struck the building. They went 
down with the structure, but each escaped with only a 
few bruises. They inquired anxiously about the effect 
of the storm in St. Louis, and particularly on Finney and 
Chouteau avenues. 

C. E. Obrist, a boarder at the Tuttle House, got one 
of his arms badly cut by falling glass. He is an electri- 
cian. 

Mrs. Dowd, one of the boarders, was missing. She 
went out for a ride on her bicycle just before the storm. 
Mrs. Dowd's husband is a government beef inspector at 
the National Stock Yards. He escaped without injury 
and hurried to the hotel to find that his wife w^as gone. 

SCENES IN THE HOSPITALS. 

A trip through the east side hospitals at midnight 
revealed terrible suffering. At St. Mary's the Sisters 
were treating fifty cyclone victims. Dr. McLean had 
charge of the surgical ward, and was assisted by Drs. 
Fairbrother, Le Haan and Thompson. The doctors had 
been busy since the storm sewing up and dressing wounds, 
The patients had sustained injuries of various kinds, but 
fortunately only a few were considered in a critical condi- 
tion. Two or three died after being received at the 
hospital. Several had fractured skulls, and several others 
were injured internally. The reporter talked with a 
number of the patients. 

Roy D. Moore, a Vandalia freight clerk, was found 
with his riorht arm broken between the elbow and wrist. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 219 

His liome is on the Missouri side of the river, near the 
corner of Page and De Hodiamont avenues. He said he 
had been caught in the wreck of the Vandalia freight 
office, on the Levee, with about thirty others. He was 
pinned in near Mat Quirk, Joe Crean, Thos. Dougherty, 
Mr. Givens and Bob and Ed Bhind. They were all taken 
out alive, and as to the twenty-five others he could not 
say what became of them. 

On a cot next to Moore lay two children, Nancy and 
Albert Fierce. At their side sat an older sister and their 
mother, who had escaped with but a few bruises. The 
boy's shoulder and breast are badly injured, and Florence's 
right wrist is dislocated. Their home near the Crescent 
elevator, was blown over and demolished, the entire fam- 
ily being buried in the ruins. 

The next cot west was occupied by a boy with his head 
in bandages. No one seemed to know wdio he was or 
where he had been brought from. The little fellow was 
asleep. Nearby was an unknown man with his head tied 
up. He had come from the operating room and was un- 
conscious. One of tlie attendants said he was not ex- 
pected to live long. He had been taken from the ruins 
of the Martel House. 

In the same room was Frank Barr, who works in Nel- 
son Morris' stock yards. He was at home. No. 7 Rock 
road, when the storm came up. His house w\as blown to 
pieces and he and his wife were buried in the ruins. He 
didn't know how seriously his wife w^as injured. His 
own injuries were not very serious, consisting of bruises 
and cuts. 



220 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

In the hallway downstairs was John Malloy, who was 
caught in the ruins of the Air Line freight house and 
completely covered. He complains of pains in his side 
and left shoulder. 

Thomas Dougherty, a Vandalia freight clerk, who lives 
at 1322 North Seventh street, St. Louis, escaped with a 
bruised hip and cuts on his head. 

Al Tudrer was another storm victim found in the hall- 
way. He comes from Hamilton, C, and came to East 
St. Louis a few days ago with Charles Kinney, of Indi- 
anapolis, in search of work. When they saw the storm 
coming they crawled into an empty box car. The car 
was blown over and the occupants badly bruised, one on 
the shoulder and head and the other on the hip. 

In another ward Dr. E. Thompson was found sewing 
up a frightful gash in Patrick Trainer's head. The in- 
jured man was delirious and imagined that several men 
had him down and were beating him. A couple of men 
were holding him while the Doctor stitched up the wound. 

In the same room was John McMahon, with his shoul- 
der blade and rib broken and back injured. He came to 
East St. Louis from Alton a couple of days ago. He 
sought shelter, when the storm came up, in a little frame 
house near the Green Tree Hotel. The house was demol- 
ished and McMahon's clothes were blown from his body. 
He was cut and bruised all over, but no bones were broken. 

Deamie Bender, who lives at 2609 Walnut street, this 
city, and works iior the Big Four line, was found in that 
room with his feet injured. He went down with the 
freight office of that line, along w^ith a number of others. 




221 




^22 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 223 

THE BABIES TAKEN AND THE MOTHERS LEFT. 

Joseph Burke occupied a cot in the hallway near the 
operating room. He works for the Air Line, and was in 
the act of closing the doors of the freight house when the 
building was blown down. Burke was injured internally 
and his left leg was broken. 

Peter Harris, on the next cot, wanted the attendants to 
let his folks, at 1205 Liberty street, Kansas City, know 
that he had not been killed. Peter's left arm and one rib 
were broken, and he was otherwise injured, but will prob- 
ably recover. He worked for the Illinois Central, but 
was injured at his boarding house on the levee. 

On the second floor of the hospital was Mrs. Horace 
Trump, whose pathetic story would turn the coldest heart. 
Mrs. Trump was at the bedside of a sick sister, with her 
year-old baby in her arm, her 4 -year-old daughter being 
near her on the floor, when she saw the storm; but it was 
impossible for her to get out of the room, so sudden was 
its approach. The storm in all its fury struck the house 
and the flying missiles struck her, knocking down the 
walls of the building over her and her two daughters, 
killing the baby and 4 -year-old daughter instantly. Mrs. 
Trump was considerably bruised and hurt internally, and 
it is as if by a miracle that she escaped the fate which 
befell the children. It was fully four hours before she 
was rescued from the position and taken to the hospital. 

Miss Minnie Evans was brought in suffering with a 
broken leg. 

Fred Weide, a railroad man, hurt in the tumbling walls 
of the Tremont house, suffering with a double fracture of 



224 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the right ankle, a dislocated shoulder and several broken 
ribs. He was in the parlor of the hotel with several 
others, saw the storm coming and thought there was no 
danger; that the building was strong enough to withstand 
its fury, and made no attempt to escape. He was caught 
in the collapse. 

Wm. Murray was very seriously injured internally, as 
well as suffering from a broken arm and broken limb, 
also a dislocated hip. 

Mary Hanet was very seriously injured about the head, 
and also internally. 

Joe Duffy, a clerk of the Vandalia Kailroad, suffered 
intense pain from a very painful injury. M*'. Duffy had 
the whole right side crushed in. 

W^HEN MORNING CAME. 

When the dawn came it was possible to see the devas- 
tation wrought by the storm in East St. Louis. The sky 
was clear, and the beauty of the morning strikingly 
contrasted with the scene of desolation that was dis- 
closed. 

On the river bank, from Kehlor's mill on the south 
to the elevators on the north, not a house was standing. 
These huge structures and the cold storage company's 
plant were badly damaged. The river bank was lined 
with wrecks of boats. 

With the river banks as the base, the entire triangle 
formed by what is called the Island, there is not a whole 
house standing. Even the Relay Depot had its corners 
broken and two huge roundhouses were shaved off below 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 225 

tlie tops of the middle of the locomotives which stood 
within them. 

One brick house stood without one wall, disclosing the 
interior and furniture exactly as the dwellers had left it. 
The pictures, beds, bureaus, washstands, chairs, tables 
and even the lamps on the tables were undisturbed. A 
room or two of several houses were left. 

For the remainder either the walls and roofs of the 
frame houses were folded together like cardboards and 
lay flat on the ground or they were broken into kindling 
wood and were scattered to the four points of the com- 
pass. The brick houses were heaps of building materials. 

It is marvelous that 10 persons escaped from buildings 
so completely wrecked. 

The Island, on each side of the roadway, looked like a 
vast lumber and truck heap. 

Freight cars were overturned or wrenched from their 
trucks and turned completely upside down. 

Across the creek, although few houses escaped damage 
and many were demolished, the destruction was neither 
so general nor complete. But in every direction the eye 
rested on ruins. Walking the length of Missouri avenue 
and looking up and down the cross streets one would say 
that a third of the houses were wrecked and seven-tenths 
were damaged. 



15 



226 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



THE DEATH ROLL. 

Identification of the dead was in many cases difficult, 
and the lists were still growing when this work went to 
press. Following is the latest revision of the sad roll- 
call in St. Louis, Mo. : 

Anderson, Wm. F., 38, 606 South Seventh street. 

Altus, Henry, 62, 3026 LaSalle street. 

Anderson, Richard, ]029 North Seventh street. 

Allen, Charles Edwards, 43, Platte City, Mo. 

Alcornero, Charles, 19, address unknown. 

Ahillern, John, 26, 2929 Missouri avenue. 

Archambo, Alex, 45, City Hospital. 

Bradshaw, Wallace, 20, 923 N. Jefferson avenue. 

Bowler, Wm., 28, 328 Montrose avenue. 

Benwall, Fred., 24, Jefferson and Shenandoah. 

Boecklin, Ulrich, 48, 1309 South Seventh street. 

Bergeest, John, 27, 2408 South Broadway. 

Bohle, Fred., 64, 2807 Wisconsin avenue. 

Benz, George, 22, Twentieth and Gratiot streets. 

Bolm, Augusta, 63, 1706 Park avenue. 

Bene, Sylvester, 5, 1418 Ohio avenue. 

Carnero, Charles, 19, 1411 Papin. 

Claypool, Cora, 67. 2641 Papin. 

Claypool, Ethel, 10, 2641 Papin. 

Cahill, Mrs. Mary, 70, Jefferson avenue and Papin. 

Craddock, Martin, 36, 1211 Carr street. 

Cheney, Emma L., 42, 1432 Mississippi avenue. 

Crook, William, 33, 1611 Lafayette. 

Crump, Catherine A., 47, 2711 Park avenue. 

Creamer, Kate F., 20, 2643 Caroline street. 

Craig, Charles, 817 Walnut. 

Dieterich, Peter, 67, 1516 South Tenth street. 

Duggan, Rose, 55, 1527 South Eighth street. 

Dunn, Michael, 42, 1213 North Fifteenth street. 

De Martini, Sophia, 16, 402 South Twelfth street. 

Eyman, T. A., 47, 3129 South Jefferson avenue. 

Enders, Chailotte, 40, 616 Rutger. 

Elser, Joseph, 32, Gas Company stables. 




227 




228 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 229 



Fischer, Frank H., 6, 1944 Papin. 

Friesecke, Mrs. Clara, 30, 609 Hickory. 

Friesecke, Estella, 6, 609 Hickory. 

Friesecke, Edna, 4, 609 Hickory. 

Fiegler, Caspar, 40, 3313 Salina. 

Gall, Julius, 26, 1507 Sulphur avenue. 

Gearse, Julia, 64, 1306 South Third street. 

Gibson, Henry, 38, 5526 Odell avenue. 

Gray, I/croy, 5 months, 1523 Hickory. 

Gegan, Henry P., 34, St. I^ouis House. 

Gardner, Anna, 21, 1848 Menard. 

Gardner, Emma, 1, 1S48 Menard. 

Goff, James, 29, 3715 Chouteau aventie. 

Gallagher, Chas. L., 4, 2136 Cdlifornia avenue. 

Gregory, Wm., 20, 1213 North Sixteenth street 

Goodman, Adolph, 40, 1816 Linn street. 

Hessel, John, 17, 1109 Emmett. 

Hess Harry, 28, 1109 South Seventh. 

Herbert, Geo., 22, Minneapolis, Mian. 

Helix, Mrs. Melanie, 69, Seventh and Rutger 

Howell, Mrs. Alice, 27, 714 Rutger. 

Howell, John, 35, 714 Rutger. 

Howell, Ida, 7, 714 Rutger. 

Hassenfratz, Daniel, 71, 1014 Armstrong. 

Home, Isa, 26, 1432 Mississippi avenue. 

Hickey, Maggie, 21, Vail place. 

Hermann, Catherine A., 58, 3644 Castleraan. 

HoUerman, Taylor, colored, 38, 1401 Miisouri. 

Irvin, Thomas, 65, 2220 Chouteau avenue. 

Jones, Richard, 35, 2809 Easton avenue. 

Jacobs, Bertie, E., 21, 1510 Vail Place. 

Jones, Thomas, Central Home of Rest. 

Knoll, George, 55, 1801 South Thirteenth street. 

Kuehling, Henry, 18, 2824 Oregon avenue. 

Killian, Thomas, 40, 1303 South Seventh street. 

Killian, Harry, 9, 1303 South Seventh street. 

Killian, William, 7, 1303 South Seventh street. 

Knobel, George W., 43, 1303 South Seventh street. 

Keim, George, 72, 2111 Kosciusko. 

Labar, John, 21, killed at 1819 Chouteau. 

Ivoebleiu, John, 49, 916 Barry. 

Lanahan, William, 42, gas company's stables. 



230 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Lanahan, James, 26, 2005 Biddle. 

Ivigon, Mrs. J. J., 50, 2358 Park avenue. 

Matz, Joseph, Belleville, 111. 

Mauchenheimer, Fred, 63, 1300 South Seventh. 

Mauchenheimer, Mrs. Catherine, 56, 1300 South Seventh, 

Maurer, Joseph A., 54, 1830 South Eighteenth street. 

Miller, Joseph J., 30, 1510 Pennsylvania. 

Moraghan, Thomas L., 24, 1653 South Jefferson avenue. 

M'Donal, T. Malachi, 34, 2745 Clark avenue. 

M'Given, Mary, ], 2725 St. Vincent. 

Nee, Chas., 35, 1503 Chestnut. 

Gates, Thos., 55, 2230 O'Fallon. 

Ottensmeir, Aug., 23, 3431 Gravois. 

Ottenad, William, 41, 1700 South Broadway. 

Osterman, Annie, City Hospital. 

Platschek, William, 58, 614 Rutger. 

Pomely, William, Second and Chouteau avenue. 

Poppitz, Thomas, 20, 2501 South Broadway. 

Proute, Katherine, 67, 1500 South Thirteenth. 

Plank, William, 1848 Menard. 

Rafferty, John, 23, 2223 Wash. 

Ruebeck, Chas., 55, 1236 High street. 

Rux, Matilda, 56, 716 Barry. 

Rux, Tina, 17, 710 Barry. 

Rohlfiug, Anna, 23, 2122 Geyer avenue. 

Reis, Theodore, 8, 2140 Chouteau avenue. 

Rodriguez, Mrs., 40, City Hospital. 

Sims, L. F., 37, 1707 Park avenue. 

Selp, Edw., 26, Lami and Pestolozzi. 

Sherbold, John, 53, 714 Julia. 

Smith, Andrew, 4 months, 1523 Hickory. 

Schmalenbach, Herman, 1700 South Broadway. 

Schwerdtman, Chas., 29, 2648 St. Vincent avenue 

Stephens, Thaddeus J., 23, 3728 North Market. 

Steinberf, Christian R., 23, 2648 Allen avenue. 

Schmidt, Chas., 37, 2633 Hickory. 

Schueringer, Alex., 23. 

Smith, Wm. Q., 82, Memorial Home. 

Silva, Benj., 55, 3042 Locust. 

Spillman, Martha B., 73, 2711 Park avenue. 

Steinkoeter, Adam, 15 days, 1622 South Thirteenth. 

Sudhoff, Chas., 39, 1805 Dolman. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 231 

Smith Samuel, Central Home of Rest. 
Tandy, Chas. A., 3135 School street. 
Trachter, Wm., 64, Third and Rutger. 
Tainter, Chas., 3 months, 1522 Hickory. 
Taylor, Wm., 45, 1401 Missouri avenue. 
Tolbert Mary, 30, 213)^ Market. 
Teva, Anna, 1007 Allen avenue. 
Vignette,IvOuise, 89, 1300 S. Seventh. 
Vollmer, Gustav, 69, 1300 S. Seventh. 
Winkler, William, 30, 2011 Virginia avenue. 
Woods, William H., 29, 1428 S. Eighteenth. 
Woodruff, Sarah B., 50, 2743 Ann avenue. 
Wells, Fred^ 2 years, 1728 S. Ninth. 
Wells, Theresa G., 9 months, 1728 S. Ninth. 
Wilson, Robert, 23, 4214 Cottage avenue. 
Wills, Michael, 46, 1315 S. Sixth. 
Wagner, John, 33, 919 Geyer avenue. 
Weis, Max, 49, 3100 Magazine. 
Weckerman, Anton, 40, 1938 Cherokee. 
Zimmer, Ernst, 32, 4731 Greer avenue. 
Zimmerly, Samuel, 56, 321 Russell avenue. 
Zeic, Gregor, 2507 S. Second street. 
Unknown white man at Morgue. 

Among the list of names at iirst published as reported 
missing, the following have since turned up alive and un- 
harmed : 

Captain George Zeigler, of the City of Monroe. 
Charles and Eddie Appel, 2904 Michigan. 
Miss M. Paule, 2630 S. Fourteenth. 
J. W. Johnson, Terminal Hotel. 

Inquiry into the cases of George Hesse, reported missing from 1707 
Jefferson avenue ; Mollie Thurns, reported missing from Jefferson and 
Gravois, and Lizzie, a colored woman, reported missing from 2728 Rus- 
sell avenue, disclosed that no such persons had heen known in those 
respective neighborhoods, and the reports, consequently, lack verification. 

All of these went down with the steamer J. J. Odill, 
just below the bridge. 

Morris Fisher, Hardin, Ills. 
Mrs. Gorgar, Hardin, Ills. 
Sim Woods, clerk. 
Louis Morris, cook. 



232 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

The following river men, nt first reported missing, were 
found to have miraculously escaped : 

Jas. Flanagan, carpenter Vicksburg. 

Jos. Jovin, diver. 

Larry Dauer, pilot ferryboat Christy. 

Henry Levy, fireman ferryboat. 

G. A. A. Simons, second clerk OdiU, , 

Jas. Boland, captain Pittsburg. 

Geo. Townsend, captain Odill. 

Among those known to be dead are : 

Barber, name unknown, buried under ruins of Anchor HaU. 

Colored driver for Polar Wave Ice Company, at Union Depot power-house. 

Unknown teanister at same place. 

Unknown Bohemian woman, in ruins at Thirteenth and Soulard. 

Unknown child, in ruins at Twentieth and Papin. 

Oscar Jones, roustabout, steamer Houck. 

Sol Parker, roustabout, Houck. 

Will Oaden, roustabout, Pittsburg. 

Jacob Wendt, ferryboat clerk. 

MISSING. 

The list of missing people revised to date is as fol- 
lows: 

Arnika, Louisa, 36 years. Women's Christian Home. 

Brouthers, John, 304 North Fifteenth street. 

Brown, C. M., 2621 St. Louis avenue. 

Buck, Mrs. Catherine, 78 years, 4368 Swan avenue. 

Brandenburger, Carl, 40 years, 1827 Park avenue. 

Conelly, John, Springfield, 111. 

Coouing, Alphonse, 22 years, Earlington, Ky, 

Conrad, Mamie, 22 years, Jefferson Barracks. 

Coles, Charles, 21 years, 4500 Washington avenue. 

Cook, William, 36 years, 932 North Broadway. 

Dorsey, Joseph, 23 years, 4008 Easton avenue. 

Detzer, Joseph, 25 years, 1828 South Tenth street. 

Davis, Mrs. Florence, 1419 Bremen avenue. 

Davidson, Stephen O., 21023^ Franklin avenue. 

Daniat, Philip, 30 years, Wheaton, 111.; boarded at 405 South Second 

street. 
Decker, Jean, 50 years, 2039 Biddle street. 




233 




234 



THE GREAT CYCLONIC. 235 

Eastman, Fayette, colored, 1606 Carr street. 

Ely, Teleph, Eighth and Washington avenue. 

Forfit, Hy., 18 years, Decatur, 111. 

Fruiu, Jere, 70 years, 2107 Menard street. 

Foster, Sidney, 28 years, 2107}^ A. Market street. 

Gingles, Nancy, 50 years, Beaver Creek, 111. 

Goodman, Maggie, 181(3 Linn street. 

Goodline, Iv. P., disappeared from Terminal Hotel. 

Gruenewald, Walter, 15 years, 1614 Arlington avenue, 

Harris, Jacob, 19 years, 1114 Angelica street. 

Hauck, Dr. Eugene F., 2354 Whittemore place. 

Huss, Charles, 27 years. Twelfth and Cass avenue. 

Keenan, Joseph, 37 years. Sixth and Poplar streets. 

Hardy, Albert, 35 years, Logansport, Ind. 

Johnson, roustabout, Pittsburg. 

Jean, E. T., 45 years. 

Jones, Samuel. 

Jeremiah, Ray, 44 years; worked for E. H. Berry Boiler Company; came 

here recently from Belleville, 111. 

Jencks, , 26 years, 172 Illinois street, Indianapolis. 

Keiffer, Mary, 26 years, 2110 South Seventh street. 

Keim, lyizzie, 14 years, 21U6 South Seventh street. 

Kiefer, Charles, 1307 South Seventh street. 

Kelly, E. F., 30 years, 1204 State street, Chicago; boarded at Tenth and 

Wright streets. 
Knipp, Sadie, 507 Espenschied street. 
Klein, James, 45 years, 1516 Cora place. 

Lambkin, Charles Anthony, came from Cincinnati the day of the tornado. 
McCarthy, Cal, 41 years, motorman. 
McClellan, James, 29 years, Webster Groves. 
McCarthy, Josie, 27 years, Memphis, Tenn. 
Meyer, G., 60 years, Hamburg, 111. 

McLaughlin, Joseph, 26 years; worked at Ligget & Myers tobacco factory. 
Moser, George, 73 years, 2830A South Ninth street. 
Myers, Dora, 19 years; came from Chicago the day of the tornado. 
Niesinger, A. J., Indianapolis, Ind. 
O'Leary, John, 5 years, 1449 Biddle. 
O'Meara, William, thought to be buried in the ruins at 1700 South 

Broadway. 
O'Reilly, James, worked for Laclede Car Company. 
Parker, M., 45 years. 
Probasco, Andrew P., 816 North Twenty-third street. 



236 THE GREAT CYCLoXE. 

Riley, Mrs. Mary, Second and Penrose. 

Ridley, Mary, 22 years, Alton, Ills. 

Rose, John, 19 years, 2401 South Eleventh street. 

Raack, John, 50 years, Second and Soulard streets. 

Richards, Ida, 11 Espenschied street. 

Rutledge, Charles W., 19 years. 

Reichenbacher, Henry, 37 years, 1802 Oregon avenue. 

Scott, John, Seventh and Chouteau avenue. 

Seitner, Raymond, 60 years, real estate agent of Peoria, 111. 

Simmous, Charles L., of St. Joseph, Mo., address any information to 

Simmons, Keller and Castle, St. Joseph, Mo. 
Smith, James H., 25 years. 

Schoff, Charles A., 1529 North Seventh street. 
Schulter, Kate, 29 years. 

Smith, John, 28 3'ears, Twentieth and Penrose streets. 
Sanger, Lena, 25 years. 
Surgeon, James, 60 years. 
Steinreide, Charles, 19 years, Cincinnati, O. 
Schmidt, August, 21 years, Herman, Mo. 
Struedel, F. D., 2338 South Twelfth street. This young man went cross 

the river just before the storm and was undoubtedly killed. He left 

a wife and four young children. 
Thompson, S. W., 61 years, 1917 North Grand avenue. 
Terrance, Mrs. M., 36 years, Nineteenth and Wash streets. 
Woddell, F. H., 23 years, 6057 Horton place. 
Wind, William, 40 years. 
Ward, William, 27 years, Louisville, Ky. 
Wetzel, Bertie, 2906)^ Olive street. 
Wehrfritz, Olga, 20 years. 
Wagner, Mary, domestic at Planters Hotel. 
Watkins, George, colored, 27 years, St. Paul, Minn.; stopping at 1608 

Carr street. 
Whetsel, Oscar, 4338 Fairfax avenue. 
Wul finger, John, 35 years, 2108 Bremen avenue. 
Young, John, 65 years, 3007A INIagazine street. 
Zalijigak, Frank, Jr., 21 years, 2235 Montana avenue. 
Zalijigak, Rose, 27 years, 2235 Montana avenue. 

Many of tlie missing were certainly killed, and several 
were washed down the river in the flood, so that there 
was little chance to i-ecover their bodies. 



A. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



237 



IDENTIFIED DEAD IN EAST ST. LOUIS. 



Andres, Richard. 

Anderson, Andrew 

Anderson, Dick, 

Brown, Joseph C, Paducah, Ky. 

Bean, Mis. Patrick and daughter. 

Bruce, Mrs. 

Breen, John. 

Brewer, Mrs. 

Barr, Mrs. 

Brucker, Mike. 

Bland, Robert. 

Baumhoefer, August, 56 years, 

killed at Granite City. 
Conley, Rubie, 
Corrigan, May. 
Clendenin, Irene. 
Chapman, George, 2538 University 

street. 
Collins, Charles. 
Carroll Charles. 
Connors, Mrs. 
Dilligan, Mike. 
Dean, Mrs. 
Duffy, Joseph. 
Evans, Maria. 
Franks, Joseph. 
Flanagan, Jim. 
Free, Willie. 
Fleming, H. 
Frawley, Frank. 
Frawley, John. 
Freis, John. 
Farrel, F. C. 
Griffin, Thomas, ex-policeman and 

three children. 
Gage, Mrs. Robt. and Amos. 
Gladshaw, waitress Ruff's hotel. 
Gladdue, Henry and Emma. 
Grubb, Martin. 
Hearn, John C. 



Humphreys, . 

Hayward, Scott. 

Hartigan, Wm. 

Heine, J. K. 

Hays, John, and daughter-in-law, 

Mrs. Hays. 
Hughes, J. 
Jones, Miss Ruby. 
Kildea, Michael. 
Kent, John, and Ira, his son. 

Kavanaugh, . 

Keefe, M. H. 

Kurtz, Jacob. 

Kumre, Mrs. 

Lee, Mary. 

Lucky, George 

Muery, F. 

Morgan C. 

Murray, J. W., 5234 Ridge avenue, 

St. Louis. 
Mitchell, John. 
McCann, P.J. 
McCormick, Francis. 
Murphy, Frank J. 
McCaul, Jack, drowned. 
McCormick, Francis, 32 years. 
Murray, F. 
Miehell, Miles. 
Null, Dr. C. E. 
Nicholas, P. A., Cincinnati. 
O'Brien, Edward. 
Porter, I. N., and son, aged 16, 

Brighton 111. 
Preis, F. A. 
Reed, John. 
Rose, Henry. 
Richardson, L. 
Reams, John. 
Ross, Frank. 
Roof, Mrs. 



238 



thf: great cyclone. 



Rice, W. A., Huntingbird, Ky. 

Rothe, Chas. 

Strieker, Phil. 

Snow, Sam. 

Sniber, Amelia. 

Surber, William. 

Sage, David and Mrs. 

Stock, Mrs. 

Strieker, P.J. 

Spellman, Martin. 

Smocke, Miss. 

Sprieker, Henry. 

Sullivan, Mrs. Emma. 

Sullivan, John. 

Sullivan, Mrs. James F. 



Simmons, R. E. 

Smith, W. F. 

Steppel, Stella. 

State, Mrs. George. 

Trump, Dissy and Mabel, babes. 

Vogt, Henry. 

Valentine, John. 

Valkman, Albert. 

Winterman, Henry. 

Wait, Charles and child. 

Walmsley, Peter. 

Whicher, Captain J. J. 

Windley, . 

Waldron, Mrs. E. 



AFTERMATH OF THE CYCLONE. 

Few people carried cyclone insurance prior to the dis- 
aster of May 27. A perasal of the earlier pages of this 
book will show the reason why. Within a week of that 
day millions of dollars of this class of risk had been 
written, and from all appearances the work had only just 
commenced. More tornado insurance w^as written on Dec- 
oration Day, a legal holiday, than in the entire year of 
1895 in the whole State of Missouri. The last official 
report of James R. Waddill, Superintendent of the State 
Insurance Department, shows that last year's tornado 
risks in the whole State footed up only 11,781,589. The 
premiums amounted to $20, 873, and the losses paid to 
$12,511. It was a very profitable year's business for the 
tornado underwriters, hut the cyclone in St. Louis ate up 




230 




40 



..1: 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 241 

the profits of 1895 and all 2:>revioiis years. The local 
agency that suffered most was that of Delafield & Snow. 
It had $45,000 on one building, Central Elevator B. 
The structure was damaged over $50,000, the portion 
above the bin walls being wrecked. The machinery on the 
upper floors will have to be replaced. Luckily for the 
United Elevator Company, there was no grain in the ele- 
vator at the time of the storm. The company owned ten 
elevators, but the only tornado insurance it carried was 
on Central B. Nine of the ten were damaged by the 
storm, the Venice elevator being the exception. A part 
of the roof of the main house of the East St. Louis 
elevator w^as blown oft', the engine house and boiler 
house wrecked, and an addition to the elevator partly 
destroyed. 

The grain was transferred to the Merchants' elevator. 
The Valley elevator was practically destroyed. Central 
B., as already stated, was a total wreck above the bin 
walls, including the machinery in the upper floors, and the 
river house was completely wrecked. The roof and smoke- 
stack of Central A. were blown down. The roof and 
smokestack and a corner of the building of the Union 
Depot elevator are blown away. A part of the roof 
and the smokestack of the St. Louis elevator were 
blown away, and the w^arehouse is almost a total 
wreck. The Union elevator had its roof blown oft\ 
and corner blown off the cupola and the river house and 
conveyor badly damaged. All above the bin walls of 
the Advance elevator was a wreck, and the machinery on 
the upper floors is destroyed and the engine and boiler 

16 



242 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

house wrecked. The upper part of the river house of the 
Merchants' elevator is blown away. 

INSURANCE company's LOSSES. 

The $45,000 insurance on Central B was divided about 
equally among the Royal, of Liverpool; Aetna, National 
and Hartford, of Hartford; and Home, Niagara and 
Glens Falls, of New York. St. Louis has four other ele- 
vators — Burlington, Farmers', Rogers' and Terminal. 
Only the Terminal was damaged, and that one not 
seriously. The loss is covered by tornado insurance. 
The Rogers' has tornado insurance, but the others have 
no such protection as yet. 

The insurance company that suffered the most from the 
storm was the Concordia, of Milwaukee. It was reported 
in local insurance circles that the storm would cost the 
Concordia fully $50, 000, bat according to Frank Tom- 
bridge, the company's general agent here, it will not ex- 
ceed $30,000. Mr. Tombridge received a telegram from 
the president of the Concordia to pay all claims at once 
— that of Mr. Eschrick, for damages to his store on 
Grand and Gravois avenue — and settled ten others. The 
policies on which the $30,000 will be paid foot up $250, - 
000. From February 1 up to the storm Mr. Tombridge 
wrote $206,000, and in the three days following it over 
$400,000. 

He relates several interesting incidents connected with 
his recent tornado business.- Ten days ago Mr. Ottenad, 
a merchant in Frenchtown, took out a tornado policy on 
his store. AVeduesday the building was wrecked, and 



thp: great cyclone. 243 

Mr. Ottenad killed. His family will receive 11,700 in 
tornado insurance. Another Frenchtown merchant took 
out policies amounting to $14,000 on the same day as Mr. 
Ottenad. When a collector called on him last week with 
a bill for the premium, the merchant i-eturned the poli- 
cies with the remark that $37 was too much to throw 
away. His store was badly wrecked by the storm, and 
he wishes now that he had "thrown away" the $37. 

The only St. Louis insurance company that WTites tor- 
nado insurance is the American Central, the charters of 
the others not authorizing a tornado business. "We have 
185 claims for losses from the storm," said Secretary John 
H. Adams yesterday. "They amount to not over $10,- 
000. George Ittner took out a $8,000 tornado policy on 
his residence on Ann avenue Wednesday afternoon at 3 
o'clock without paying the premium. In less than three 
hours his house was wrecked. Early next morning he 
came in and paid the premium, and reported his loss; the 
first we knew of it. We paid him $1,800 before night. 
Our next largest policy was for $2,500, A. A. Selkirk, 
the auctioneer, having divided his $5,000 tornado insur- 
ance between us and the Northwestern National, of Mil- 
waukee. The building insured was wrecked by the 
storm." 

Mr. Adams wrote policies to the amount of $600,000 
in two days. A very large number of insurers were for 
loan, trust and building companies. It has heretofore 
been their custom to insure the buildings on which they 
have made loans against loss by fire only. Now they 
are taking out tornado insurance. 



24-1: THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Geo. D. CapentfeCo. placed $300,000 of tornado insur- 
ance since the storm with the Home and Phcenix, of New 
York, and the Springfield, of Massachusetts. "We were 
up late last night writing policies," said one of the mana- 
gers two days after the tornado. "We used up all the 
blank policies in the office, and had to telegraph for more. 
Before the storm our tornado business was almost exclu- 
sively on residences. The new business is largely on bus- 
iness houses and their contents. A good many stables 
are also being insured, and considerable household furni- 
ture. People. laughed a week ago when we asked them 
to take out tornado insurance. Now they are rushing to 
get it. We were treated very nicely by the storm. Our 
policies are mostly in the West End, where very little 
damage was done. Our losses will not foot up more than 
11,500. 

INDIRECT LOSSES. 

Because the tornado ruined many mills and factories, a 
large number of men will be out of employment for weeks 
and months. Children and mothers will want because 
their providers are idle, and strong, willing men will weep 
because they cannot feed hungry mouths. How many men 
have been deprived of their opportunity to earn a liveli- 
hood cannot be stated with any degree of accuracy, but 
the majority of them are skilled workmen who have made 
good wages and had accustomed themselves and their 
families to some of the luxuries of life. 

True, there is a silver lining to this cloud. Hundreds 
of laborers are being employed to clear away the debris 




245 




246 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 247 

and rtrtisans are in great demand for building purposes. 
But this is a readjustment of the hibor conditions which 
will prove disastrous to the mechanics and craftsmen who 
toiled in the mills and factories. They cannot become 
builders, and if they are hired as laborers they will still 
be sufferers, dependent upon an humble and precarious em- 
ployment. 

The officials of many concerns which were leveled, 
frankly admitted that the disaster threw out of employ- 
ment bodies of men numbering from 25 to 200. Others 
pointed to the squads of laborers, and said they had more 
men on their pay rolls than they had before the storm. 

This comparison is deceptive. It loses sight of the 
working capital that has been blown out of the business 
of the concerns affected. This loss of capital will affect 
the workmen who were employed in those mills and fac- 
tories, as when business is resumed it may be on a smaller 
scale and with reduced forces. The weekly reports 
of the mercantile agencies showed how the credit men 
of the business world looked at the storm. Those reports 
contained long lists of factories with tornado damages at- 
tached. 

The reports did not say that these figures of diminished 
credit represented losses to workmen, but that goes with- 
out saying. Perhaps many concerns are cleaning out their 
ruined works with money borrowed to pay the laborers. 
Certainly not a few of them will be obliged to ask exten- 
sions of current loans and to make new ones in order to 
resume business. 

Time alone w^ill tell how many concerns will go to the 



248 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

wall, for the interested persons are keeping a stiff upper 
lip in the hope that they can withstand the mercantile 
cyclone that is forming, and to the credit of wholesale 
houses, many of them are offering extensions without be- 
ing asked. One cigar store owner notified his supply 
house he was as poor as the day that he was born. He 
received by messenger a receipt in full for the amount of 
his indebtedness, with a notification that as soon as he 
could open up again in any way, his store would be stocked 
for him on any terms of credit he desired. 

"All was lost save honor," — no, not quite. The repu- 
tation for honesty which the sufferer had earned for him- 
self, was sufficient capital for him to commence business 
on again. 

SUFFERING MECHANICS. 

The number of men thrown out of work cannot be 
estimated, but it certainly i-uns far into the hundreds in 
excess of the number employed to clear away the rubbish 
and repair the damage. 

The largest number of men now idle on account of the 
damage done one concern is the force of 250 formerly 
employed by the St. Louis Refrigerator and Wooden 
Gutter Co. The factory of this concern, at Main street 
and Park avenue, was burned, and is a heap of ruins. 
It will be a long time before operations can be resumed, 
and as yet little has been done to recover from the blow 
as the adjustment of tlie fire insurance is proving a 
tedious task. Eventually business will be done on the 
same scale as of yore, fortius company is rated very high 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 249 

by the mercantile agencies, and is believed to be the lar- 
gest and strongest concern of the kind in the country. 

Its recent order for 100,000,000 feet of lumber is 
talked of by kindred concerns as the largest contract of 
the sort ever made. The 2&0 persons employed in the 
factory of the St. Louis Refrigerator and Wooden Gutter 
Co. were engaged in making everything ^'from a needle 
to an anchor." 

The St. Louis Steam Forge and Iron Works, better 
known as McDonald's Forge, at Main and Miller 
streets, was badly damaged by the storm. Up to last 
Wednesday evening it gave work to seventy men. Now 
ten men are engaged in cleaning and repairing. The 
company expects to be in shape in about three weeks or 
a month. Until then sixty men will be in idleness. 

When a reporter called at the office of the Union Iron 
and Foundry Co. , Second and Barry streets, groups of 
workmen were standing on the corners. They had visi- 
ted the shop to get their pay and their tools. Similar 
scenes are transpiring daily about many like places. 

The men got the wages which they earned prior to the 
storm and they looked at the money with a knowledge 
that it may be the last they will receive for some time. 

The Union Iron Foundry Co. had 100 men in its 
shops. They have been idle since. 

TELEGRAPH COMPANIES OVERWORKED. 

The storm shut off all telegraphic communication be- 
tween St. Louis and the outside world for hours, and 
hence the reports published in other cities of the extent 



250 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

of the calamity were wildly exaggerated. It was the 
greatest disaster of the time, but St. Louis, being a city 
of 600,000 inhabitants and having over sixty square 
miles of territory, could not by any possibility be "blot- 
ted off the map" by a tornado. Yet such was freely 
announced, and one imaginative writer placed the loss of 
life'at 100,000. Telegrams and cablegrams of inquiry 
came in consequence from all parts. 

Aside from the actual storm damage sustained by the 
telegraph companies they were in an absolutely paralyzed 
condition up to the following Sunday. 

Even had not a single wire of the telegraph companies 
been destroyed by the tornado, they could not have han- 
dled the immense volume of business that was thrust upon 
them. 

Even had their armies of operators been multiplied by 
ten, every instrument clicking constantly, and the army 
of messengers been multiplied by 1,000, and the whole 
force worked night and day, the amount of business cre- 
ated by the storm could not have been promptly handled. 

Within an hour after the tornado brief bulletins were 
sent over the one or two wires remainins^ in workins: 
order to the outside cities announcino; that a terrible storm 
had struck St. Louis. At that time it was impossible to 
particularize, for the extent of the damage was unknown. 

These brief bulletins were repeated all over the United 
States and cabled to all parts of the civilized world. The 
afternoon papers of New York, Chicago, Cincinnati, San 
Francico, New Orleans, Boston and other large cities is- 
sued extra editions. They had no definite information at 




251 





252 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 253 

hand, and they relied on the imagination of their 
writers. 

These publications with their exaggerated reports were 
sold on the streets long after midnight, with the result 
that all St. Louisans abroad, and those residents of other 
cities in this country and foreign lands, who had relatives 
or friends in this city, rushed to the nearest telegraph office 
and started messages of inquiry. Hundreds of thousands 
of St. Louisans in this city, whose first thought, after 
their own safety was assured, was to reassure friends and 
relatives abroad of their escape, hastened to the telegraph 
offices and left from one to fifty messages to be sent, sub- 
ject to the delay which they knew would be experienced. 

No city in the world, in proportion to its population, 
has better telegraphic facilities than St. Louis. But the 
storm had blown down the wires and stilled the instru- 
ments, and for a few hours St. Louis was virtually in a 
world to itself. Thousands on top of thousands of mes- 
sages were stacked up here to be sent, and as great a 
number were filed in other cities for St. Louis delivery. 

In addition to the private telegrams inquiring about 
friends and in reply to queries many special newspaper 
correspondents had congregated in the city, and to a 
great extent they monopolized the wires with specials to 
their papers. Friday night nearly 1,000,000 words of 
special telegrams were sent by these correspondents. 

In these hundreds of thousands of private messages, 
business was almost a tabooed subject. One operator 
kept account for a given time of messages received by 
bin). Of the seventy telegrams he handled, sixty -eight 



254 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

were inquiries from relatives and friends. The other two 
were of a business nature. 

At the Post-office the conditions were almost as bad as 
with the telegraph companies. 

When the greatly exaggerated reports were bulletined 
over the country, thousands of telegrams poured into the 
city. They came in such a quantity that the telegraph 
companies were powerless to deliver them, and all day 
Thursday and Friday the telegraph companies put 2-cent 
stamps on the envelopes and dumped them by the bushel 
into the post office for delivery. The wires were working 
so badly that nearly all tlie replies were sent by mail, and 
this increased the bulk of the matter fully 100 per 
cent, while the force was diminished nearly 25 per 
cent. 

The telegrams were given the preference and were sent 
out as rapidly as possible: While the business mail in- 
creased greatly the amount of miscellaneous letters sim- 
ply flooded the office and the carriers were all over- 
loaded. 

The greatest increase in bulk was in the newspapers sent 
through the mails. From the newspaper offices the increase 
was only about 15 or 20 per cent. But the people all 
over the city felt themselves powerless to describe the 
storm in letters and they sent thousands of extra papers 
to their friends all over the world. The letter boxes all 
over the city were piled high with these papers. The 
volume of this kind of matter jumped up from an aver- 
age of 600 pounds per day to 10,000 and 12,000 
pounds. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 255 

TWO DAYS AFTER THE CALAMITY. 

Two days after the cyclone, save where the city has 
cleaned the streets, little had yet been done by the torna- 
do sufferers to clear up the debris. They seem still 
stunned by the disaster and apparently knew not how to 
go to work. 

Thousands of visitors crowded the thoroughfares and 
vied with each other in securing some memento of the 
storm. Their industry would lead a casual observer to 
believe that work at reconstruction had actually begun. 
Such is not the case. Labor is scarce, and the house 
owners do not seem to know how to proceed. Many of 
the residences along Mississippi avenue, Jefferson avenue, 
Park avenue and Ohio avenue can yet be saved, but the 
inhabitants do not feel assured of this, and they are 
waiting to hear the reports of the building inspectors. 

Teams of all descriptions crowded the narrow avenues 
through the ruins and scattered lime over the sightseers. 
On the green sward of Lafayette Park a company of 
militiamen bivouaced and sought the insufficient shade of 
the broken branches where once were lordly forest trees. 

A few children played happily on the sward as though 
their dwellings were not half destroyed. The sufferers 
themselves gathered in knots at the doorways of the 
houses yet standing and spoke in quiet voices, looking 
passively resigned. 

On the side streets every form of vehicle was in use. 
Furniture 'Vans and those who could not afford to pay the 
high prices charged for teams were carrying the personal 
effects which survived the storm to places of safety. 



25(3 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

They were all too busy to mourn longer, and a more 
clieerful feeling prevailed. A "St. Louis Star" reporter 
passed several women who were singing as they stood 
guard over the goods which the male members of the 
family wei*e rescuing from the debris of fallen walls. 

The linemen worked industriously day and night cut- 
ting down and coiling the broken wires, which hung 
everywhere, so that the streets were no longer snares 
for the unwary. Out Jefferson avenue each householder 
seemed to have constituted himself a member of the street 
cleaning brigade, and order rapidly succeeded the chaotic 
state which has prevailed after the cyclone. At 
half a dozen houses workmen were engaged tearing down 
unstable walls so that the work of reconstruction could 
be resumed. In front of a store a parrot in a battered 
cage, his feathers disheveled and possessing a general 
appearance of a hard luck tale, was noisily scolding the 
world for going awry. His indignant protestations over 
his ill-treatment caused a smile to illuminate many a care- 
worn countenance. At 2310 Hickory street a goat, which 
somehow surviv^ed the storm, was trying to butt away the 
bricks which had covered its little domicile in Mr. John 
P. E wart's back yard. 

" Fve had dinner and I guess the wife will have a bit 
for supper, so what's the use worrying," remarked Henry 
Oldhaus cheerily, as he scraped the mortar off the 
bricks of his fallen house on Rutger street, so as to pre- 
pare for rebuilding. 

Where there were no injuries sustained the working 
people in the side streets take the calamity much more 




257 




258 



THE grp:at cycloxe. 259 

philosophically than in the more aristocratic neighbor- 
hoods and are earnestly going to work to repair the dam- 
age. For one thing, they have not suffered the loss of 
the thousands of pretty and valuable bric-a-brac, which 
represent years of collection on the part of the wealthier 
housewives, and then they are more habituated to hard 
knocks. So that it is probable that such streets as Hick- 
ory, Eutger, Caroline and St. Vincent will be rebuilt as 
they were before, except for lack of shade trees, far 
sooner than the avenues skirting on Lafayette Park. 

VISITING THE CYCLONE DISTRICT. 

Multitudes were attracted to St. Louis to see for them- 
selves what the storm had done. The greatest crowds of 
all were on the Sunday following the calamity, when 
they were dangerous in their magnitude. Over 140,000 
people came in by train on that day. 

The visitors swarmed the sidewalks in the business 
portion of the city, and together with the crowd of sight- 
seers of home folks choked up the thoroughfares leading 
the path of devastation in South St. Louis. Exclama- 
tions of wonder, horror and amazement were heard every 
where al)out the scene of devastation. The steady un- 
comfortable drizzle which set up about 3 o'clock Sunday 
afternoon did not serve to drive the visitors from the 
scene and not until nearly train time did they consent to 
leave the scenes of horror. 

The visitors began to arrive in the city on special ex- 
cursion trains Sunday morning at 7 o'clock. From that 
hour on until 2 o'clock in the afternoon regular and 



260 . THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

special trains continued to arrive at short intervals. 
Each train Avas loaded to its fullest ca})acity and in short 
order the midway, lower and ui)per sitting rooms of the 
station became congested. Never before in tlie history 
of the Union Station had such a larsre crowd assembled 
there except on the night of its dedication. For the first 
time since the opening night the upper sitting room was 
crowded to overflowino:. In the lower sitting: room there 
was barely breathing space, while out on the midway 
there was not even comfortable standing room. 

Viewed from an elevation the midway seemed a mov- 
ing, surging sea of hats. For a while in the afternoon 
the crowd thinned out, but about 4 o'clock the dense wave 
of humanity surged back into the station again, overflow- 
ing and flooding the entire building. The dense crowd 
hampered persons who wished to go from one part of the 
station to the other. 

Despite the congested condition of the station when 
everybody was homeward bound, the people continued to 
pour into the place in a steady stream through every en- 
trance. It seemed that the station would not hold another 
person, and yet thousands continued to arrive and lose 
themselves in the throng. 

One pugnacious excursionist who objected to having his 
corns stepped on by anybody, created some little excite- 
ment on the midway by striking a stylishly dressed young 
man, with the exclamation, "Get oflP my corn, you dude." 
The well-dressed young man made an eflPoii: to appease 
the citizen and forced his way to other and safer quarters. 

The splendid facilities aflporded by the Union Station 



TIFE GREAT CVCLOXE. 261 

for handling large crowds were severely tested. Superin- 
tendent Diinlop was in evidence here, there and every- 
where, giving instructions to his regular force of attend- 
ants and extra corps of assistants. Station Master Jere J. 
Coakley was one of the busiest men about the station. 
Upon him devolved the duty of superintending the going 
and coming of passengers and the arrival and departure 
of trains. 

The task of looking after thousands of people and di- 
recting the movements of 100 regular and forty -five special 
trains is an arduous one. Mr. Coakley early in the day 
found liimself almost swamped by a host of people who 
could not or would not understand that an information 
bureau was in easy reach. It soon became necessary for 
the Station Master to lock his door and pull down the 
curtain of the window in order to attend to his resfular 
duties. "This is the biojo^est crowd we have ever 
handled," said Mr. Coakley. "There were over 100,000 
persons who came in on the excursion trains. During the 
day w^e have transferred 40,000 to and from St. Louis. 
At a rough estimate I would say that over 150,000 people 
passed through the Union Station to-day. This is a cyclone 
in travel." 

Bernard W. Frauenthal, Master of the Bureau of In- 
formation, was probably the busiest man in the city Sun- 
day. Questions rained in from the midway in a torrent. 
There was no rest. People desiring information were 
legion. Mr. Frauenthal was unable to make any diminu- 
tion in the long line of people desiring information. He 
was provided with two assistants, but even then there was 



262 THK (iKKAT CYCLONE. 

no getting ahead of the crowd. The more lie gave answers 
the thicker they seemed to come. ''Talk about hurri- 
canes and one thing and another," remarked Frauenthal to 
a friend, "but this is hurricane, cyclone, tornado, all in 
one. " The day was the liveliest ever spent by the persons 
who dispense information to the traveling public. It is 
estimated by Mr. Frauenthal that fully 100,000 questions 
were asked and answered Sunday at the Bureau of Infor- 
mation. 

ANOTHER DISASTER NARROWLY A\ER'rED. 

There was a time at Union Station Avhen, for a few 
moments, it looked like the city was to be visited by 
another calamity, indirectly brought about by the more 
terrible catastrophe of a few nights ago. A jelly-like, 
squirming mass of wornout humanity was packed and 
jammed in the Midway passage. And that passage wnth 
its immense area of 36,000 square feet, was practically 
impassable. Women could be seen sitting on top of 
United States mail boxes, to which places of safety they 
had been raised by relatives or friends. Families were 
forced apart ; women were crying. There was no room 
inside the building. The spacious waiting-rooms down- 
stairs and up were but a repetition of what was taking 
place along the gates affording entrance to the trains. 
Woman fainted. There was a danger of children being 
crushed to death. 

There were fully 30,000 people in that inclosure 50 
feet wide and 606 feet in lenojth. Somethins: had to be 
done to save lives. The jam became unmanageable. 




263 




264 



THK GREAT CYCLONK. 2C>5 

Thousands in the multitude had stood up during the 
night before or rode on the platforms of coaches in order 
to get to St. Louis and satisfy a craving that had gone 
forth throughout the adjoining States to witness the ruin 
and woe that had been left in the wake of the Storm 
King's trail. The constantly increasing gathering kept 
on crowding those already in tlie midway opening closer 
to the big iron railing, and everyone seemed to realize 
that at that moment it required but a very slight provoca- 
tion to create a panic that would be fraught with great 
fatality. Men climbed up the iron railing, women 
shoved babies through the larger holes in the bottom of 
the fence to save them from the apparently unavoidable 
disaster. Regardless of rules of order, all the gates were 
at once thrown open, and the station turned over to the 
multitude. 

Vice-President Bryan, of the Terminal Association, at 
once telephoned police head -quarters that the crowd had 
gotten beyond their control, and asked that 50 patrolmen 
be sent to the station as soon as possible in order tliat 
disaster may be averted. In the meantime Vice-Presi- 
dent Ramsey, of the Wabash, had taken care of the 
babies and little children that had been passed through 
the openings in the bottom of the fence, and the several 
women who had fainted were removed to places of safety. 
Although trains, crowded to the guards, had been leav- 
ing Union Station since three o'clock in the afternoon, it 
seemed the jam was an inexhaustible one. 



'266 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

OXE HrXDHED AND FORTY THOUSAND, ACTUAL COUNT. 

By actual count there were 140,000 passengers who 
arrived at and passed out of the gates at the Union Sta- 
tion on Sunday. Out of this number, however, there 
were, by a conservative estimate, about 100,000 passen- 
gers who came from other points and from other States 
to go over the wreck and ruin in this city. The other 
40,000 passengers were those who returned from East St. 
Louis on the trains of the Terminal Association. It was 
expected that an immense throng of people would gather 
in the city, and the Terminal people arranged trains ten 
minutes apart between St. Louis and East St. Louis for 
tlie benefit of the excursionists who wished to visit both 
sides of the river. Out of twenty -three roads running 
into this city, five companies alone brought in by actual 
figures 25,000 people. The Wabash had thirteen trains 
in, with forty-six cars, and brought in over 7,000 excur- 
sionists. The Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern had 
seven trains in with fifty-six cars, and had about 4,500 
passengers. Vandalia brought in 5,000 passengers on 
eleven trains, with sixty -eight cars. The Burlington 
made no specially reduced rates for the occasion, yet they 
had eight trains into the city^ with thirty-eight cars. The 
Clover Leaf had only three trains in, with twenty-six 
cars, but they carried about 3,000 people. 

The Louisville Air Line had four trains, with twenty 
cars. They were so short of passenger equipment that 
they had to bring freight cabooses into service in order 
to try and handle the people. The Missouri Pacific and 
Iron Mountain system brought in twelve trains in,wit]i sev- 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 267 

enty-five cars, Tlie Bluff line had only two trains in, with 
thirteen cars. They were hard up for cars and could not 
begin to handle tlie people. They even had to stop the 
sale of tickets out on the line, because they could not fur- 
nish the necessary cars to haul the passengers. On one 
of their trains in Union Station there were passengers 
actually riding on the roof of the rear car. The St. Louis 
and San Francisco had five trains in, with twenty -eight 
cars, and C. , P. <fe St. L. brought in two trains, with 
twenty -one cars. The I. C. brought in five trains, with 
thirty-four cars. The Louisville and Nashville brought 
in four trains and twenty-eight cars. They had to cancel 
one of the excursions from points on their line because 
the necessary coaches could not be secured in time to take 
care of the passengers. The Mobile and Ohio had two 
trains and fifteen cars. Li addition to all regular trains, 
upon each of which there was more or less excursion travel, 
there were twenty-nine special excursion trains into the 
city. Vice President Bryan, of the Terminal Association 
said there had never been anything like it before. 

HALF A MILLION SPECTATORS. 

The throng from outside was re -info reed by greater 
throngs from within the city limits, and it is believed at 
least 500,000 people passed along the desolated streets 
during Sunday. The strangers mingled with the resi- 
dents on a sight-seeing tour in the storm's wake, and all 
day long the mighty throng surged through the streets. 

The People's Railroad, wliich runs through a great part 
of the damao^ed section of the city and around two sides 



268 THK (iRKAT CVCLOXR. 

of Lafayette Park, and the Coiiipton ?Iill division of the 
Lindell, Avhich skirts the park on the north, carried thous- 
ands and thousands of passengers. The Jefferson avenue 
line, which was in operation as far south as the bridge 
across the railroad tracks, carried tliem ])y the thousands, 
while others came on foot, in buggies, wagons and 
in cabs. 

From both ends of the city the Broadway cable hauled 
people by the 200 and 800 to the train, with three-car 
trains running in either direction every minute in the day 
from early morning till long after dark. 

Around the principle ruins Avhere there was loss of life 
or particularly heavy property damage the curious gath- 
ered till the streets were blocked, and it was all the po- 
lice could do to keep the crowds moving. From every 
street and avenue they poured into the streets where the 
storm's fury was greatest, and gazed in open-mouthed 
amazement at the horrid picture presented. 

From the West P]nd residence portion of the town they 
came by the Lindell on all of its branches, the Suburban 
and the Olive street cable, invading thence the section 
laid waste through every street aff'ording ingress. The 
Laclede avenue and People's lines brought their pro rata 
from the west and southwest, and the Cass avenue. North- 
ern Central, Mound City, Bellefontaine, Union, Fair 
Grounds lines and Citizens' lines fairly emptied the pop- 
ulace of the northwest part of the city into the Lafayette 
Park and Broadway districts. 

The crowd double discounted any that lias ever been 
seen at the Veiled Prophet's parade, the Fair or the ilium- 




269 




270 



THE GKP]AT CYCLONE. 271 

inations, and the estimate of its number was given at 
from 400,000 to 500,000 by conservative men. 

FEEDINCI THE HUNGRY. 

A half dozen wagons were busy all day distributing 
food to the hungi-y. Over a hundred teams were kept 
busy moving furniture from the w^reeked buildings to dry 
and comfortable quarters for those who did not have the 
means to pay for a van. There were hundreds of them. 
The most activity in that direction was in the Soulard dis- 
trict. Headquarters are at the Soulard Street Police Sta- 
tion. The Captain has given up his room to the Relief 
Committee, and the building was thronged all day with 
applicants for aid. 

A perfect system had been established for the exten- 
sion of aid. All applications were received and recorded 
by the clerks in charge. The chairman then sent a re- 
sponsible person with the applicant to investigate the 
merits of the case. If the visitor re[)orted that the ap- 
plicant was deserving, an order was given for the needed 
aid. If it w^as a moving wagon, a teamster was given an 
order to move the applicant at once, and it w^as done 
forthwith. If the party needed funds to pay rent and 
was found woi'thy an order bearing the signature of the 
chairman was given him agreeing to pay one month's rent. 
These orders were redeemed with cash when presented 
for payment to the treasurer of the fund. 

AFTER THE CROWDS HAD GONE. 

Sunday night, amidst the ruins, all was darkness. 
Quietness reigned supreme. An occasional Hash of elec- 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



tricity as a trolley slipped from the wire, would momen- 
tarily light up the scene. Here and there people flitted, 
carrying lanterns and looking like straggling lightning 
bugs in June. A sudden rap of a policeman's club on 
the sidewalks startled the passersby. Occasionally a 
gong on a cable car would break the stillness of the night. 
Sheet lightning at intervals lighted up the eastern sky and 
brought out into relief the frowning ruins of homes, 
stores, churches, buildings and clubs. The twisted stumps 
and broken trees in Lafayette Park made a ghostly sight. 
Ruins, ruins everywhere. There were no lights stream- 
ing from the windows of the mansions on the avenues. 
Occasionally a straggling beam would flicker out from a 
house not totally wrecked. All was as silent as if the 
city was deserted. Such was the condition of affairs last 
night out in the ruined residence district. 

There were but few people on the streets. Policemen 
were everywhere keeping guard against the crooked gen- 
try. Out Jefferson avenue could be seen the flickering 
lights of torches moving about as the men worked on the 
ruins of the j)ower house at Geyer avenue. This was the 
only sign of life out there. 

West of Jefferson avenue in the Compton Hill district 
it was as silent as a graveyard. Once the tinkling music 
of a piano broke the stillness for a moment and then there 
was silence again. The park was deserted save for the 
oflScers at the. police station. Coming on down Lafayette 
avenue the only speck of light was at the Phoenix Brew- 
ery, where Engine Company No. 7 has its temporary 
quarters. The old City Hospital w^as deserted. Not a 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 273 

sign of life was visible. Occasionally a brick or piece of 
debris would fall, and when they struck the ruins below 
the crash would re-echo for several moments. Here and 
there lights could be seen through the broken trees in the 
houses untouched by the storm. 

On down and the wrecked Soulard Market loomed up 
in all its ghastliness. One or two men stood about 
swapping personal experiences and telling of the heroic 
deeds they performed. The ruins of the old Insane Asy- 
lum frowned ominously from the north. To the south 
light was streaming from the Soulard Police Station. 
From upstairs the echo of a hymn floated out into the 
stilly night. 'Twas a queer state of affairs. Downstairs 
the police were guarding the offenders against public 
peace and morals. Upstairs the members of the Soulard 
Station Mission were worshiping their Deity. As the 
old hymn ''Nearer, My God, to Thee," floated out on the 
night air a sergeant came to the door to answer a knock. 
He listened a moment, took off his hat until the last note 
of the hymn had died away, then, with a sigh, replaced 
it, saying : "Misery makes strange bedfellows." 

ALONG BROADWAY. 

Along lower Broadway there was not much life. 
The saloons were almost deserted. No drunken people 
could be seen. The calamity had sobered everyone, and 
most of them have remained so. On the fronts of the 
stores were large banners announcing great sales of dam- 
aged stock. Around the ruins of Ottenad's building a 
crowd of idlers gossipped of the happenings of the day. 

18 



274 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

On down Soularcl street toward the river the quietude 
of death reigned. Beneath the ruins, there were many 
ghastly corpses. Over on Rutger street no one appeared 
but an officer, who silently surveyed the passerby, won- 
dering what could induce anyone to wander about that 
dark and desolate place. Opposite the old French Mar- 
ket on Broadway on the vacant lot a small circus tent 
was lighted up. A band was playing a lively air. 
Through the tent could be seen the silhouettes of a few 
patrons who were willing to sit through the chilly two 
hours to while away the time. Across the street, silent 
and dark, stood the ruined church. 

Down in the manufacturing and tenement district there 
was not a sign of life. All the wrecked buildings were de- 
serted. The Relief Committee had moved the tenants to 
other quarters. Piles of broken brick, battered tin and 
other debris still littered the streets, and it was dangerous 
to walk about. The Levee was dead. Not a roustabout nor 
a Levee rat could be seen. At intervals a train darted 
along the elevated tracks. A few lights on the steamers 
told of their presence, while the swollen river rushed by 
on its headlong pitch to the gulf. 

Across in stricken East St. Louis could be seen mov- 
ing lights, telling of the activity over there. A train 
crawled cautiously over the wrecked Eads Bridge with a 
load of freight. A tug soon afterwards came puffing 
down the river, disturbing the spell. 

Swinging back again into the wholesale district, the great 
Cupples buildings stood out in bold relief, with broken 
windows and twisted roofs. Numerous small buildings 




275 




276 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 277 

in rains made a desolate scenein the stillness of the night. 
Chouteau avenue was deserted and black as printer's ink. 
Park avenue was like a lonely country lane. The 
only thing that broke the stillness of the night was 
the whirr of the machinery in the wreck of the cable 
power-house as it ran in the open air. St. Vincent avenue 
was like a ruined city — no sound, no life, no existence. 
It was late. The city was asleep, unconscious of the 
misery, the suffering, the woe of the morrow. 

BURYING THE DEAD. 

In all the wide, wide world there never was a sadder 
city than St. Louis was this sad Sunday. It was the 
day on which she buried her dead. 

There were 200 funerals in St. Louis and her sister city 
on the Illinois side of the turbulent Mississippi, nearly 
every one of which was that of a tornado victim. 

All day long these mournful corteges, wending their 
way silently and tearfully to some peaceful cemetery, 
were seen in every section of the city, and on the avenues 
leading to the principal burying grounds one procession 
followed another so closely as to make it look like one 
long, unbroken line, miles in length. It was no unusual 
sight to see two and even three funerals moving side by 
side on streets leading from the devastated districts, and 
such a vast concourse of mourners probably never gath- 
ered in a modern city to witness services so sad. 

The scenes at some of the churches were painfully im- 
pressive, and in certain localities the sacred edifices 
seemed to have been convei'ted into morgues. There 



278 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

were families of two and three and in one case of five per- 
sons buried from the same church or residence. In many 
cases whole families were killed, and their homes were 
piled into rubbish heaps in the cellars. Friends and rel- 
atives of the victims gave them decent burial from their 
own homes, or from undertaking parlors near the once 
happy homes of the deceased. 

The priests in some of the churches preached half a 
dozen funeral sermons during the day. As fast as one 
body was carried from the edifice and the mourners had 
started to follow it to its windowless palace, another took 
its place on the catafalque, which was placed in front of 
the chancel rail on Friday to remain a fixture until Mon- 
day in anticipation of the numerous funerals that must 
be held. There were a dozen instances in St. Louis and 
East St. Louis where there were four and five corpses in 
the churches, residences and undertaking establishments 
awaiting the sacred ofiices. 

Mothers, wives, sisters, fathers, brothers, the widow 
and the orphan, mingled their sobs and their tears over 
lifeless clay that until Wednesday's horror had lived and 
moved and loved. Grief and anguish and heart aches 
were plainly stamped on the faces of the sad -eyed groups 
that gathered about biers in many of God's houses. The 
lamentations of the bereaved and tlie soft, sweet music of 
church choirs, chanting the requiem, were rudely dis- 
turbed by the ring of the mason's trowel, the ceaseless 
chop, chop of the lineman's ax and the hammering of the 
carpenter as the work of clearing away the debris and 
bringing order out of chaos went steadily on, regardless 



THE GREAT CYCLONE- 279 

of the Sabbath. It was a Sunday such as no great city 
ever spent before. 

Singularly enough scarcely a bell was tolled. The task 
of conducting the funerals, pronouncing the last words 
and keeping the almost numberless processions moving 
assumed such serious proportions in some localities as to 
obscure its pathetic features to a certain extent, and re- 
duce it almost to the plane of a business transaction. 

The undertakers were scarcely equal to the emergency, 
and in not a few cases the tiny white coffins enshrouding 
infants, and even those of children 10 and 12 years of age, 
were taken to the cemeteries in cabs and carriages that 
were converted into hearses for the time being. It was 
sad to see infants at the breast and sunny -haired toddlers 
of 3 or 4 years — and there were many of them whose in- 
nocent lives were snuffed out in the storm — carted to 
chill, cold graves, some in almost deserted cemeteries in 
the southern section of the city, scarcely noticed by neigh- 
bors and friends in the general confusion that prevailed. 

There were funerals, too, of those who have fared bet- 
ter in the matter of this world's goods; more pompous, 
more stately and more orderly, but none that were 
marked by greater or more sincere grief. Side by side, 
the funerals of the wealthy wended their way to costly 
mauseleums with those of less fortunate brethren and sis- 
ters destined for humble graves. 

It was nightfall before the last groups of mourners left 
the burial grounds, and the wet sod was turned back over 
graves that will make May 27 a memorable day for years 
to come in St. Louis. 



280 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

SAD FUNERAL SCENES. 

Amid all the bustle there were striking reminders of 
the tragedy of the elements, and hearses stood on several 
thoroughfares. 

Playmates when they were girls, clerks for the same 
firm and meeting death locked in each other's embrace. 
Misses Emma Cheney and Isa Home were buried Sat- 
urday. No bells tolled as their storm-bruised remains 
were taken to the tomb. The church where they wor- 
shiped was leveled by the same awful wind which blew 
out their life light forever. The house where they had 
lived so many happy days was not to witness the pay- 
ment of the last tribute paid by the quick to the dead. 
It also lay a wrecked mute witness of the mighty power 
which struck and spared not at all. Miss Cheney and 
Miss Home were clerks at the Sawyer Manufacturing 
Company's building, No. 1819 Chouteau avenue, and 
when that building was literally blown to pieces, like 
many others, they had no time to escape. As they felt 
the building giving way beneath them, they rushed into 
each other's arms and so met death. When a rescuing 
party reached them, they were yet in that final embrace 
and as the same beam struck both they must have died 
together. The girls, neither was twenty years, had 
boarded at 1529 Mississippi avenue, but that house was 
wrecked, so the remains were taken to the residence of 
a relative of Miss Cheney, Mrs. B. T. Handley, 1432 
Mississippi avenue. It was first intended to bury them 
in the same grave, but Wm. Home, father of Miss Isa, 
preferred to take her body to Shrewsbury, and inter it in 




281 




AI,ONE IN the; ruins. 



282 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 283 

the family lot. However, both were consigned to the 
grave at 11 a. m. 

The funeral services over the remains of Miss Cheney 
were conducted by Rev. Mr. Williams, a Methodist 
minister, and were simple but impressive. A simple 
wreath of flowers rested on the bier. The coffin con- 
tained the simple inscription, ^'Emma Cheney, died May 
27, 1896." The choir of the Jefferson Avenue M. E. 
Church sang some simple hymns, and Dr. Williams 
spoke feelingly of the fair dead girl, and of the uncer- 
tainty of life. The interment occurred later at Bellefon- 
taine Cemetery. 

There was grief in the family of little Patrick Galla- 
gher Saturday afternoon, when they followed the white 
hearse, which bore his mangled remains from the home 
of his childhood, at 1729 Iowa avenue, to the Bellefon- 
taine Cemetery. The child had celebrated his fifth birth- 
day on Tuesday last, and on Wednesday was riding on 
a hobby horse which had been presented to him, when 
the tornado crushed out his life. The funeral services 
were held at the residence, and were conducted by Rev. 
Mr. Fountleroy. 

There was no hearse and only four mourners who went 
with the poor torn remains of Johnny Helwood, colored, 
killed at 2113 Papin street. A plain white box resting 
on the knees of his mother and father with two brothers 
of the dead boy on either side of the casket were borne 
in a carriage to the African Methodist Episcopal burial 
ground. The father, Washington Helwood, had a large 
bandage across hi^ brow. He had attempted to escape 



284 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

from the house when it fell, carrying his little son, John, 
in his arms. A heavy beam struck him a glancing blow, 
knocked the boy out of his arms and fractured his skull. 
With the loss of the house the Helwood family was 
doubly bereaved. They suffered the child at first to be 
taken to the Morgue, but when the news of their loss 
reached the A. M. E. congregation, of which they were 
members, money was contributed to prevent the grief- 
stricken suffering the additional blow of seeing their 
child buried in the potter's field. Rev. John Mason 
preached the funeral service, which was held in the open 
air, with ruins of houses on every side. A large assemb- 
lage of both white and colored sufferers gathered around 
the bier and entered into the services with heartfelt sym- 
pathy. 

AN EAST ST. LOUIS FUNERAL. 

Among the many funerals there was none which 
elicited more real sympathy from the general public than 
that of City Tax Collector David S. Sage and his wife, 
who were buried in a single grave at St. Peter's Cem-. 
etery. 

Not only the fact that Mr. Sage stood high in social, 
political and financial circles brought many to see his 
bier, who, through those channels, associated with him 
in life, but the more touching circumstances of his tragic 
and pathetic death. Mrs. Sage was the accomplished and 
pretty daughter of Attorney E. R. Davis. She was mar- 
ried to the handsome real estate man about five years ago, 
and the pair lived in a fine home on Eighth street. About 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 285 

a year ago they rented their residence and a temporary 
home was established in the Strickler household. 

On the fateful evening the couple had been entertained 
by St. Louis friends and returned to the city about 5 
o'clock. A few moments were passed at Mr. Sage's 
office, and Mr. and Mrs. Sage noticing the threatening 
clouds, hastened their steps towards Collinsville and St. 
Louis avenues. As they reached the corner, an eye-wit- 
ness says, they stopped for a moment and attempted to 
enter the front door of the grocery. The door was either 
locked or fastened in some way, and a break was made 
for the hallway. Just as they entered the door the awful 
crash came. The air was filled with flying missiles and 
the house began to fall forward. The couple were then 
standing in the landing leading to the first flight of steps. 
Mrs. Sage leaned on her husband's arm, while her other 
arm was high up on his breast, as if she were half -pleading 
for further protection. The request was granted without 
ceremony, and long before the building finally crashed 
Mr. Sage held his wife firmly in his arms, while hers were 
as lovingly clasped about his neck. In this position their 
mangled bodies were found, and as this was the position 
in which they were last seen alive, it is believed that when 
they noticed the awful effect of the storm upon the back 
part of the house and knew escape was impossible in any 
direction they awaited in terror and in affectionate embrace 
their doom. 

The big building rocked and swayed before finally 
plunging into the shapeless mass for probably ten seconds. 
That space of time must have appeared as so many days 



286 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

to the pair, but they were surely motionless during the 
time extending from the storm's first impact until the 
building was razed. 

A thieves' opportunity. 

Gentlemen possessed of thieving propensities flocked 
to St. Louis from all parts of the country to ply 
their nefarious business in the storm-swept districts. An 
entire gang of Cincinnati thieves arrived Sunday on an 
excursion train, and its members were promptly arrested 
by Chief Desmond's men and lodged behind the cold iron 
bars of the cooler at Twelfth and Clark avenue. These 
gentlemen were treated to a forced stay at the City Work- 
house, and will not soon forget the experience of attempt- 
ing to take advantage of the excitement and the disor- 
dered state of affairs in this city subsequent to the tor- 
nado. The names of the Cincinnati men were not made 
public by Chief Desmond. He had reasons for with- 
holding them. 

A number of the light-fingered gentry from Chicago 
also blew in with the storm. They enjoyed about two 
hours' liberty, and then kept the Cincinnati friends com- 
pany in the dismal confines of the holdover. Neither the 
Chicago nor the Cincinnati crooks were allowed to make 
a single steal. They were nabbed almost before they 
had taken a breath of the exhilerating atmosphere com- 
mon to St. Louis, and others who followed met with the 
same experience. 

Kansas City and several other cities were also repre- 
sented at the holdover. In fact, thieves«from all parts of 




287 




288 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 289 

the United States were soon registered at that city insti- 
tution, and from present indications they will remain 
longer than they expected ; not free, however, to roam at 
will, robbing demolished residences and stores, but con- 
fined behind locked doors. 

A large force of extra police and detectives were de- 
tailed at the Union Station and throughout the damaged 
district. Thieves were arrested without unnecessary de- 
lay and sent for safe -keeping to the holdover. Chief of 
Detectives Desmond went throusfh the wind-swept locali- 
ties every night, and the Board of Police Commissioners 
met in session daily, considering measures to protect the 
property of storekeepers and citizens whose buildings 
were damaged. 



INCIDENTS OF THE CYCLONE. 

NARROW ESCAPES, DEEDS OF HEROISM, RECORDS OF DISASTER 
AND DESOLATION. 

Thrilling and miraculous escapes during the storm were 
numerous, but that of George A. Simons, second clerk of 
the lost steamer J. J. Odill, is specially worthy of note. 
Mr. Simons and First Clerk W. S. Woods were in the 
cabin when the storm struck. The boat was torn from 
the wharf by the fury of the storm, and when in mid- 
stream was struck by the Libbie Conger and ov^erturned. 
When the crash came Mr. Woods called to his compan- 

19 



290 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

ion, "Save yourself, George, the boat's gone," and those 
were the last words ever uttered by the unfortunate first 
clerk, as at that instant the boat overturned and went to 
the bottom. Mr. Simons came to the surface entangled 
in wreckage, and drawing a long breath, dived un- 
der the water again, this time coming up clear of the 
wreck. He then swam to some wreckage which he recog- 
nized as part of the cabin of his boat, and in an exhausted 
condition pulled himself on top and floated down the 
stream. 

About the foot of Chouteau avenue he passed a steamer 
which he recognized as the Harbor Boat, and in endeav- 
oring to get on board he lost his hold on the portion of 
the cabin which had been his support, and narrowly es- 
caped being run down. He then came in contact with a 
log, which he managed to get astride of, and continued 
his perilous trip down the river. Shortly after this he 
passed the Bald Eagle, but concluded to stay with the 
log rather than again risk his life trying to get on board, 
as he was now in a very exhausted condition and chilled 
by being in the water. 

Further down he passed more boats, the names of which 
he could not see. And after two hours and a half he was 
rescued at Arsenal Island, four miles from where he 
started, by two men in a skiff, Avho landed him on the 
island more dead than alive. Mr. Simons says he was 
blown down stream a distance and then back again up 
stream, only to float down again during the next lull in 
the wind, and in this way consumed two and one -half 
hours making the trip of four miles. He lay scarcely 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 291 

able to move all night on the island, and was picked up 
next mornaig by the tug Susie Hazard and brought to 
the city. Mr. Simons has spent most of his life on the 
river, and is an expert swimmer, and to this he owes his 
life. First Clerk AVoods, his companion, went down with 
the ill-fated boat, and his body has not been recovered. 
It is a certainty that five people perished on this boat, the 
bodies of three having already been recovered. 

FATE OF A HARDIN. ILL.-, MERCHANT. 

The finding of the body of Morris Fischer, of Hardin, 
111., added another to the long list of tornado victims. 
Mr. Fischer was the leading merchant of his town and a 
man of means. He was 60 years old, and left a widow, 
a son and several dauo-hters. 

He was in St. Louis for a few^ days before the tornado, 
making purchases and paying bills. He left on the steam- 
boat Odill, which also carried $1,000 worth of goods he 
had bought in the city. Ever since the wreck of the boat 
anxious inquiries were made about Mr. Fischer, but it 
was nearly a week before his fate was definitely known 
to anyone, and not until ten days later that the remains 
were sent to his home. The body was found in the river 
fifteen miles south of St. Louis, near Columbia, 111., by 
some fishermen, and was allowed to lie on the river bank 
a day and a night. The Coroner at Columbia, 111., was 
notified, an inquest was held and the body buried. On 
it were found a few papers revealing Mr. Fischer's iden- 
tity, also 17.50 in money. His gold watch and chain 
were missing, and for a substantial man of business the 



292 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

sum raentionbd and the slim package of papers seem sur- 
prisingly small. While it is not as yet known that the 
remains were tampered with, the circumstances decidedly 
give color to that supposition. 

The fact that a day and a half w^ere allowed to elapse 
before the body was moved from the river bank speaks 
for itself. 

As soon as the identity was made clear by his papers, 
telegrams were sent to the family of deceased and to the 
Krenning Glass Company of 820 and 822 North Fourth 
street, wdth whom Mr. Fischer was on close business and 
friendly relations. 

The Krenning Glass Company at once notified the 
authorities at Columbia that a casket would be sent as 
fast as a wagon and team could get there, the railroad 
route being temporarily blocked. In the meantime ihe 
son of deceased, accompanied by a friend, proceeded to 
Columbia, had the remains disinterred and personally 
identified them. They then left for St. Louis to purchase 
a casket. Fortunately they first called on the Krenning 
Glass Company, who had already forwarded the casket, 
otherwise duplicate coffins would have been bought. 

SWAM FUU HIS LIFE. 

Had not Frank Curry, a small boy of 14 years been 
a good swimmer, he doubtless would now be at the bot- 
tom of the river with many other victims of the cyclone. 

The boy was taken to the old House of the Good Shep- 
herd wdth a seriously injured right arm. He told a remark- 
able story of his escape. He was standing on a coal 



^ > 

3 o 



2 ^ 



G > 

50 • 




293 




NEW 12-STORY CENTURY nUII.DING AS IT WAS DURING THE STORM. 

294 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 295 

barge at the foot of Rutger street when the storm came 
up. Something struck him on the arm, and for a moment 
he was dazed, and the next thing he knew^ he was in the 
river. All around him the waves were dashing, while 
above the wind schrieked and roared. Everything was 
so dark, that he could not see the sliore. The brave little 
lad did not lose his presence of mind, however, but suf- 
fered himself to be caiTied by the current until the dark- 
ness disappeared. When it did he found that he was only 
a short distance from the bank, and he succeeded in reach- 
ing it, but not without great difficulty. He was exhausted 
and fell upon the Levee, where he was picked up a short 
time later. 

WAS DUG OUT UNHURT. 

Fred. Mauchenheimer, son of the man who owned a 
saloon on the first floor of the tenement at Seventh and 
Rutger, where thirteen were killed, had a thrilling expe- 
rience and a narrow escape. He said : 

* ' I was tending bar for my father. Just before the 
storm struck the house it became so dark that I could not 
distinguish objects. I was just outside the bar when the 
building fell. I don't remember much about the first 
crash. I was struck on the back of the head by the ceil- 
ing, and fell by the side of some boxes that were piled 
up in the front part of the saloon, and saved from being 
crushed. I was unconscious for a moment, and when 1 
came to it was a moment before I could realize what had 
happened or where I was. I then called for help, and 
they dug me out in about half an hour. My father was 



29() THE C4REAT CYCLONE. 

lying underneath me, but the blow from the ceiling had 
killed him. My mother was about 4 feet away. and 
crushed to death. Ed. Schlunt was lying about 2 feet 
from me, but was unhurt, and was taken out when I was. 

DUG HIS OWN WAY OUT. 

Anton Hoover was in the second floor of the three- 
story carriage factory of Louis Neibling when the tor- 
nado struck it. The second and third floors crushed through 
into the first, and Hoover came out without a scratch and 
dug his own way out of the ruins. Neibling was in the first 
floor and ran into the back yard before the building fell. 
Vogel was also in the second floor and escaped as nar- 
rowly as Hoover did. 

TRIED TO SAVE HER DIAMONDS. 

When Dr. J. T. Pirtle's handsome and richly furnished 
dwelling at the corner of Ohio and Park avenues col- 
lapsed in the cyclone it buried beneath its fallen walls 
and roof Mrs. J. T. Pirtle, her mother, Mrs. Lucinda 
Newcomb, and daughter, Mrs. Lulu Smith. Mrs. Pirtle 
found strength enough to clear her way out of the debris. 
How she managed to scramble over the fallen wall and 
out of the ruin she is unable to state. Mrs. Lulu Smith 
was in the dining room when the crash came. She made 
a rush to her sleeping apartments for her valuables. She 
had just grabbed one diamond ring when the floor above 
came down and she felt lierself hurled to the floor. She 
managed, however, to scramble to the top of the debris. 
Then the brave young lady and her mother set up a 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 297 

search for Mrs. Newcomb. They called to her but re- 
ceived no answer. In attempting to dig away the debris 
both ladies got their hands cut and bruised. Finally the 
wind ceased in severity and several men came to the as- 
sistance of the women. Mrs. Newcomb was found buried 
beneath plaster, planks and bricks and was unable to 
speak or move. She is 80 years old. The family slept 
in a neighbor's house that night and next day took up 
quarters on Chippewa street, near Pennsylvania avenue. 
Mrs. Pirtle, her mother and daughter are all severely in- 
jured. Mrs. Newcomb is confined to her bed. The 
damage to building, furniture and loss on jewelry totaled 
$15,000. 

A PERILOUS VOYAGE. 

John E. Massengale, general manager of the St. Louis 
and Tennessee River Packet Company, related some of 
his experiences while on a ten mile voyage on a partially 
wrecked wharf boat. The boat was at the foot of Locust 
street and the steamer Belle of Calhoun was tied to it. 
"We paid but little attention to the storm until it was 
almost upon us, " said Mr. Massengale. 'It struck the 
boats from the east and forced the wharfboat out on the 
shore, at the same time badly damaging the office. We 
thought, however, that it would stay there, but in a 
second a harder blast struck us from the west side, throw- 
ing the boat back into the river and wrecking the office. 
Besides myself, in the office, was Wm. Peniston, Capt. 
John Keiflein, Miss Cecile Daly and the office boy. 
When the crash came Mr. Peniston rushed down stairs 



298 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

and clung to a stanchion. I started down, telling Miss 
Daly to wait till I could see if there w^as a safe place on 
the stairs. When I got part of the way down I saw the 
roof ])eing rolled up and thrown across the deck, and 
knew that there was no place there for us. I started 
back, but ])y this time three walls of the office had been 
torn out and I found that we could go neither way. 
They joined me on the stairway, where we were slightly 
protected by a portion of the wall that remained in the 
narrow box-like stairway. By that time we were out in 
the river; the boats being bumped against other boats 
and barges that had been broken loose and in momentary 
fear that the wharfboat would be crushed and sunk. 

^'We passed and repassed the City of Providence 
sevei'al times and were propelled by the wind from one 
side of the river to the other. We finally landed on the 
Illinois side, about ten miles below. The Belle of Cal- 
houn was with us all the way and afterward sunk be- 
side the wharfboat. We got a skiff and came across the 
river. Leaving Miss Daly at a farm house, the men of 
the party set out for the city, and I reached home about 
2 o'clock the next morning. Including several members 
of the crew of the Belle of Calhoun, there were sixteen of 
us on the boat, and, looking at it since, I can hardly see 
how any of us escaped alive." 

DRIFTED TO THE BARRACKS. 

On the day of the tornado Hugh Pattison, ex-clerk of 
the Criminal Court, A. J. Gallagher, C. and Fred Meyer, 
Fred Filch and Will Zepp were aboard their yacht 




2 99 




300 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 301 

Gazelle, at the foot of Rutger street, overseeing altera- 
tions preparatory to entering the boat in the Alton races. 
When the storm came up all of the party, excepting Pat- 
tison, went aboard a coal barge for greater safety. Pat- 
tison watched the storm from the yacht, and saw the ele- 
vators and buildings along the river trembling. He saw 
a horse blown into the water, and the buggy torn to 
pieces. Boats in this neigliborhood began to break from 
their moorings, and he then concluded to go on shore. 
As he was about to step from the yacht to a yawl the lat- 
ter whipped into the air and whirled over a train of 
freight cars. He grasped the side of the yacht, which 
was lifted by the wind and carried over a coal barge out 
into deep water and sunk. Pattison went down with it. 
When he came up he grasped two small pieces of floating 
wood and tried to swim toward shore. As he passed the 
steamboat Mad ill, the pilothouse w^as blown off and 
landed on his head and back. Pattison was stunned, and 
again went under w^ater, but he came up a moment later, 
and again struck out for shore, still holding on to the 
sticks of wood. The effort to get to land was too much 
for him, and he drifted down as far as Jefferson Bar- 
racks, where Captain Henry Ley he, of the tugboat Louis 
Houcke, picked him up. 

The tug itself was nearly sinking, and while the crew 
were w^orking at the pumps, Pattison was almost thrown 
into the river again by a heavy gale which struck the 
boat. After effecting a landing at the foot of Arsenal 
street, Captain Leyhe rendered every assistance to Mr. 
Pattison, whose spine was injured by the blow from the 



302 THE GREAT CYCLUNE. 

pilothouse. Scarcely able to walk, Mr. Pattison started 
for bis home at Jefferson avenue and Madison street, 
which he reached late at night. Dr. Marks was called, 
and pronounced the injuries serious, but not dan- 
gerous. 

The men who took refuge in the coal barge suddenly 
found themselves drifting in midstream. Three of them 
secured the services of a fisherman and were brought to 
the Missouri shore. The others drifted with the barge to 
the Illinois bank, which they reached in safety, and then 
the barge sank to the bottom. 

WHEELS IN THE AIR. 

One of the strangest sights witnessed in St. Louis as 
the result of the tornado's depredations was the power- 
house of the People's Railway Company, at the corner of 
Eighteenth and Park avenue. The magnificent building 
was completely dismantled, and the expensive machinery 
of the cable road was exposed to the elements. It was 
a strange sight to see a big plant like that running while 
the building inclosing it was in ruins. 

Thousands and thousands of people went to the place 
on cars, in carriages and on foot, attracted by the novelty 
of the sight. Operating, as it was, under the most ad- 
verse conditions that could be imagined, it is safe to say 
that never in the history of the road has it carried as 
many passengers as it did wlien it resumed running. The 
threatening aspect of the dull, murky clouds that hung 
overhead did not deter the crowds from flocking to the 
devastated district, and even when the rain began to pour 



THE (JRKAT CY CLONK. .*i03 

down there was no perceptible diminution in the vast 
throng that crowded every square foot of the ruins. 

At the corner of Eighteenth and Park avenue especially, 
the sight of tlie cable plant running almost in the street, 
with its stacks down and without even a roof over it, was 
so unusual and the evidence of the irresistible force of the 
elements so plainly demonstrated that the sightseers 
seemed dazed, and the combined efforts of a dozen police- 
men were necessary to prevent them from standing on 
the tracks where the trains were sailing around the curve 
at a dangerous rate of speed every half minute. Any 
number of people were brushed from the side of the tracks 
by cars moving either way, but those who took their places 
paid no attention to it. 

SAVED BY A "DUMB WAITER." 

The family of Henry Kohrbach, who keeps a saloon in 
the old People's Bank building at Broadway and Park 
avenue, escaped being killed in the storm in a peculiar 
way. Mrs. Rohrbach and her four children were on the 
second floor when the storm struck their house. A 
"dumb waiter" runs from the saloon to the second floor. 
Mrs. Rohrbach dropped her children into it and then fol- 
lowed them. Just as Mrs. Rohrbach jumped into the 
shaft the roof crashed in and the second and third floors 
were a mass of ruins. In the meantime Mr. Rohrbach, 
who was in the saloon below, pulled the children and 
his wife out of the shaft as fast as they came down. The 
first floor was not damaged, and beyond a few slight 
bruises and a shaking up, the four children and Mrs. 



804 THE (iKEAT CYCLONE. 

Kohrbach were not hurt. The shaft of the dumb waiter 
saved the lives of all five, as the second floor was com- 
pletely wrecked. A large chimney fell into the room 
where Mrs. Rohrbach and her children were. 

MYSTERIOUS MUNN FAMILY'. 

On the 16th of May P. T. Munn, his wife and twelve 
children left Lincoln, Neb., to make their home in St. 
Louis. Eleven days later the entire family, with the possi- 
ble exception of one son, Frank Munn, were lying dead 
somewhere beneath the wreck left by the storm. Frank es- 
caped. He sent a telegram back to his father's relatives 
in Lincoln, and then he, too, disappeared. The most 
diligent search failed to locate him. Where he is, or 
where his parents and brothers and sijiters met their fate, 
is unknown. 

The Western Union and the Postal Telegraph Com- 
panies could find no record of any message sent by Frank 
Munn, though they admitted that in the great quantity of 
business attended to in the last few days they might have 
neglected to register the sender of such a message. 

The police were equally ignorant of any dead by the 
name of Munn, or of the visit of the living Frank Munn. 
The dead could not l)e among the unidentified, for no 
children's bodies were uuclaimed. 

THE CHIME OF THIEVES. 

Thieves have added incendiarism to their infamous work 
in East St. Louis, and the militia promptly announced 
that they would shoot to kill any suspicious persons seen 
prowling about. 




305 



20 




300 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 307 

Saturday night after the cyclone the residence of Wm. 
Mathews, of the Fire Department, on Main street, near 
Railroad avenue, was entered by thieves, who ransacked 
the building, taking all small articles of any value. They 
then fired the building. The Fire Department was im- 
mediately summoned by the discharge of carbines by the 
militia, and arrived on the scene in time to prevent the 
building from being damaged to any great extent. 

HEROIC WORK DONE BY AMBULANCE DRIVERS. 

In the hurry and worry incident to the work of rescue, 
the almost heroic work of the ambulance drivers was 
hirgely overlooked. These men braved the fury of the 
storm, defied the elements and even looked death in the 
face in the performance of their duties. Amidst totter- 
ing w^alls, live dangling wires, over heaps of brick and 
mountains of debris, these men guided their teams and 
ambulances in their search for the injured. No one 
thought of danger. Personal safety was forgotten for the 
moment. Suffering humanity needed surgical aid. 
Through them this aid could be rendered. No other in- 
centive was necessary. Out into the fury they drove. 
Back they came with the wounded and dying and out again 
into the ruined path of the storm they dashed, ever alert 
for the signal of distress or the cry of an injured man. 
Truly no more noble work was performed by any body 
of men during the great emergency work. 

Health Commissioner Starkloff w^as not unmindful of 
this; he is full of praise for the brave men who guided 
the ambulances about the city and brought the poor un- 



308 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

fortunates to places of safety where surgical aid could be 
rendered. He was unstinted in his praise of their brav- 
ery. Not only did he commend the drivers but he de- 
clared that his staff was the best medical and surgical 
staff in the whole world. "Why, if I had to go through 
the battle of Gettysburg I would pick my own staff as the 
one which would do the work. I cannot say enough in 
praise of my men. I have not been able to personally 
thank them for their assistance, but I gladly take this 
means to extend to one and all my heartfelt thanks for 
their manly conduct in this great emergency. The em- 
ployes of the St. Louis health department are the best 
men in their line in the world. That is no idle talk. 
They have proven it." 

HORSE AND A LIFE WIRE TANGLED UP. 

A man on horseback hitched his steed in front of the 
Flannigan building, opposite the Police Station in East 
St. Louis. In some manner a live wire which was dang- 
ling from the pole happened to touch the animal, which 
w^ent nearly wild in an instant. He sprang backwards, 
breaking the halter, and then made a dash at the door of 
Schneider's saloon, smashing in the screen. Then turn- 
ing, he shot across the road like another tornado. 

In front of the station a number of the Belleville 
soldiers were sitting on the plank walk that had been 
torn up by the storm. They were expecting to go on 
guard mount in a few minutes, and w^ere swapping yarns 
and cigarettes with great gusto. The frightened horse 
burst into the crowd, scattering them right and left like 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 309 

a flock of sheep. Some of the boys dropped their guns 
and dashed into the station, evidently thinking the tor- 
nado was making a return trip. 

The unfortunate horse went clear across the walk and 
down some 10 or 12 feet into the lot that lies between 
the stati m and Kurrus' livery stable, and there he wand- 
ered around like an uneasy ghost all night long, no one 
coming to claim him. At last accounts he was still un- 
claimed. Singularly enough, he was not injured in any 
way by his fall. The soldiers returned, picked up their 
guns and went on duty, saying nothing. 

TRUE BROTHERLY LOVE. 

When men of means and prominence become laborers 
at the service of paupers, those who were reduced to pov- 
erty by the storm, charity becomes glorious. 

Down in the wrecked district Superintendent Sampson 
of the Wells, Fargo Express Co. worked like a beaver 
all day after the cyclone. He had a half dozen of wagons 
at work and liad personal charge of one of them. lie 
did not hesitate to carry a mattress into the lowly quar- 
ters of the poor, and it seemed his especial delight to 
hand some old negro woman a box of provisions, perha[)s 
more than she had ever had at one time in her life be- 
fore. 

Mr. Bauer, President of the Bauer Grocer Co., was a 
worker with the poor and could be seen rushing about 
between the Relief Headquarters at Soulard Street Sta- 
tion and the poverty-stricken homes, carrying baskets of 
food to the hungry. 



310 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Several prominent physicians were at work with the 
poor. Dr. Louis Drechsler, 2701 Blair avenue; Dr. 
Jacob A. Hartmann, 1400 South Broadway, and Dr. 
Albert B. Vogel, 4232 Westminster place, worked all of 
the day with the victims of the storm. Whenever a per- 
son or family was reported to the police as sick and unable 
to pay for medical attention these doctors would call on 
the afflicted, treat them and supply them free with all the 
medicine required. 

If one wanted to see charity in all its beauty there was 
lots of it where the tornado swept. 

IIOW^ DID IT GET THE DIAL? 

The propensity of the late storm to do queer things was 
strikingly exhibited at the northeast corner of Broadway 
and Park avenue, where a large street clock was perched 
on the roof of a building. The dial of this clock, possi- 
bly three feet in diameter and made of iron, was lying in the 
street in front of No. 16 engine house al 1337 South Broad- 
way. It was unbroken. The strange feature of the matter 
is the fact that the hands of the clock remain unfastened. 
How the wind managed to screw the dial off is peculiar in 
itself, but how it could remove the dial without tearing 
the hands off with it is inexplicable. 

One person who observed the phenomenon suggested 
that the hands were -made of rubber. 

CHIEF GROSS AVAS ROLLED. 

Eugene Gross, First Assistant Fire Chief, had a hair- 
raising experience in the tornado, although he escaped 
serious injury. Chief Gross was returning to the engine 




HODcr.:: r-^Tioor; 



311 




HEADQUARTERS, REMEE COMMITTEE. 



3 12 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 313 

house on Seventh street from a small fire in the South end. 
Just as he reached Seventh and Locust streets the bolt of 
lightning that demolished the gasometer on Fourteenth 
and Gratiot streets struck. Gross at once turned his 
horse south again and began a wild ride for the scene of 
the disaster, through the blinding rain. Huge scrolls of 
tin roof, heavy signs, barber poles and missiles of every 
description hustled about him. At Walnut street he 
turned west and had just reached Eighth street when the 
tornado picked up the horse, buggy and driver. The 
vehicle was overturned and separated from the animal, 
which was dashed against the curbing. The Chief himself 
was blown clear down Walnut street to Sixth, being rolled 
over and over on the street in all the mud and rain. He 
succeeded in securing refuge at this point and discovered 
that the only injury he received was the severing of a 
small artery in one of his fingers. The horse was pretty 
severely bruised. 

HE SAVED A CITY. 

One of those instances of silent, unconscious heroism, 
which makes the blood thrill and the eyes shine, was the 
work of Frank Horner, the Superintendent of the water 
works in saving the water supply of East St. Louis. 

Had his presence of mind deserted him or his brave 
heart failed him. East St. Louis might and in all prob- 
ability would have been a mass of smoldering ashes. A 
city split into kindling would have made a splendid feast 
for the fire fiend, but he was cheated of his booty by the 
clear head and iron nerve of Frank R. Horner, who never 
for an instant forgot his duty. 



314 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

The water works are situated in the north end of the 
island, about two miles from the big bridge. When the 
storm broke, the power house was felled as with the blow 
of an ax, and the great mass of debris came piling around 
the engine which supplied the city with water. 

Frank Horner was there at the time, and, reckless of 
danger, he ran to his engines to see what damage had 
been done. To his horror he found that the steam pipes 
were broken off by the falling bricks, and he knew what 
this meant. 

East St. Louis lay two miles below him in ruins and at 
the mercy of the fire fiend. If he could not repair his 
engines the whole town would be wiped out. 

Rushing into the street he fairly flew through the wires 
and broken telegraph poles, yelling with all his might. 

"Fifteen dollars to ev^ery man who will work at the 
water works!" 

He kept this up until he had a crowd at his heels and 
then he led them back to his battered and dismantled 
engines. 

Throwing the ruins aside he got down to where the 
breaks were, and then he did something which risked the 
life of every man in the building, his own included. 

If he could stop up the steam pipes all would be well, 
and sawing out four-inch plugs he ordered them driven 
into the gaping holes. 

This done he crowded on ninety pounds of steam, and 
sent the welcome tide of the Mississippi water rushing 
through the mains to the city below just on the verge of 
a terrible conflagration. 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 315 

It was a desperate thing to do, but it was justifiable, 
for it saved the city. 

The dry white pine plugs swelled with the water and 
held fast, and the next morning when Fire Chief Purdy 
heard the story and realized what this man had done he 
threw his arms about his neck and said: 

^'By God, Frank, you've saved us all.''' 

And he had, too, for the rain had stopped when the 
water came, and Benjamin Horn's great stave factoy next 
to the Hetzel mills was already aflame and would have 
gone but for the welcome water. 

A janitor's FATE. 

When the storm destroyed the old Saxony school, on 
Barry street, between Seventh and Eighth, the entire 
household of the janitor met death beneath the falling 
walls. 

The family consisted of John Locklein, aged 49, his 
sister, Matilda Rux, aged 56, and her daughter, Tiene 
R,ux, aged 16. They occupied a little cottage adjoining 
the school at the rear. The heavy walls of the big school 
building gave way before the wind's strength. They fell 
on the cottage, crushing it like an eggshell, and buried 
the occupants beneath a mass of bricks and morter and 
splintered timl)ers. The bodies when recovered were 
horribly mangled. 

The Lutheran Evangelical School was a landmark. In 
former years it was largely attended by the children of 
well-to-do Germans of South St. Louis. Of late years the 
school has been superceded by others and the old struct- 



316 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

ure was negotiated for sale not long ago and was next 
year to be used as a school for colored pupils. 

PENNED UP FOR SEVERAL HOURS IN A BASEMENT. 

The family of Capt. Henry Sackman, living opposite 
to the Douglas school building on the Island, were among 
the many who had narrow escapes from death. 

Realizing the danger of the storm, Mrs. Sackman 
sought safety in flight. 

Gathering her children together she ran across the 
street into the basement of the Douglas School. 

She had scarcely cleared the front gate before the sec- 
ond story of the brick house in which she lived blew down. 

A moment later, when the little party were safely hid- 
den in the basement, the heavy school building collapsed. 

Ton after ton of stones and bricks came tumbling 
down, but the basement walls withstood the shock and 
Mrs. Sackman and her children were saved, though thor- 
oughly drenched with rain. 

Capt. Sackman is superintendent of the Wiggins Ferry 
Co. on the East Side, is President of the School Board 
on the Island and has been a member of the City Coun- 
cil for twenty years. 

TEN DOLLARS FOR A NEWSPAPER. 

Rev. Fr. J. J. Furlong of New Madrid, Mo., was a 
passenger on the Iron Mountain train coming to St. Louis 
the day after the tornado. He has many relations in St. 
Louis and his mission was to ascertain whether or not 
they were safe. 




317 




318 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 319 

*'I have never seen such an excited condition as pre- 
vailed along the line of the Iron Mountain," said he. 
"At New Madrid we were unable to hear a word from 
St. Louis. Many persons who had relatives and friends 
in this city rushed to the telegraph office to wire them 
asking if they were safe. They could get no reply to re- 
peated messages, and as a consequence they took the first 
train for St. Louis. We could not get a St. Louis paper 
anywhere. Offers of $5 and $10 were made for a paper 
at every station along the line at which we stopped. The 
train on which I came up was so crowded that both men 
and women were standing in the aisles. 

' ' At a point a short distance from the city some one 
secured a St. Louis paper and then there was a tremen- 
dous scramble for it, as all wanted to see whether their 
relatives were among the dead. As a compromise they 
agreed that I should read aloud the account of the storm 
and the names of the dead and wounded. It was a trying 
task for me, as I shrank from reading the death list to 
those whose relatives might be named in it. It proved 
that there were several on the train who had friends in 
the list of dead and injured." 

ALONE IN THE WORLD. 

Of what a week before was a happy family there was 
but a weeping husband and father, who mourns over the 
graves of his two idolized daughters and his wife. 

The storm in its fury did not spare the home of the 
Frieseke's, at 615 Hickory street. It crushed in the 
roof and beneath it was buried the whole family. At 



320 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

the storm's approach Estella and Edtia, girls of 6 and 
4 years, just beginning to open their eyes to the pleasure 
of childhood, huddled close to their mother, she hardly 
30 and enjoying the fulness of life. The husband bolted 
the windows, secured the doors and extinguished the 
light, the latter to prevent the place catching fire should 
the house fall. 

Above the crashing of falling houses all about them 
came the ruin of their own structure and they were crushed 
beneath it. 

An hour later he was taken out with only a few 
bruises, but his wife and children had been crushed to 
death. 

Frieseke was nearly crazed with grief. He visited the 
spot to-day where the tornado snatched from him that 
for which he had lived and with the thoughts that came 
to him he wept and wished that he, too, was dead. 

SHE LOVED HER DOG. 

When the sun crept over the river a few days after the 
storm its first rays fell on the form of a little girl of not 
more than 10 years, who was watching and weeping over 
the ruins or her home, at 916 Soulard street. 

She was Lorna Clarkson, and beneath the wreckage of 
her home was buried the great mastiff dog that had 
guarded her from the time she could remember. 

The attachment grew so great between the two that 
doubtless had the dog been spared and the girl buried he 
would have taken her place as chief mourner on the 
ruins. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 821 

Two men who weve looking for work sympathized with 
the child and got the lifeless corpse of the dog from the 
wreck. The girFs father carried it away. 

SHANTY BOATS ESCAPED. 

Members of the houseboat colony along the river front 
in South St. Louis congratulate themselves on their nar- 
row escape from the fury of the wind. 

These frail crafts are protected by two high banks and 
hav^e the additional protection afforded by a series of im- 
mense ice houses extending for half a mile along the river 
front. 

JS'one of the little houses were afloat when the storm 
came up. Their occupants could see portions of houses 
up on the bluffs being carried over their heads far out 
into the river, but they were below the deadly storm 
cloud. 

A FAMILY NEARLY EXTERMINATED. 

One of the saddest incidents of the big storm w^as the 
almost total wiping out of the Windhaus family of East 
St. Louis. The house in which the family resided was 
totally demolished. As a result, Lena Windhaus, the 
daughter, is dead, and Bernard and Mrs. Windhaus, the 
father and mother, are lying on cots in St. Mary's hos- 
pital on the verge of death. "Both were injured to such 
an extent that their recovery is despaired of by the sis- 
ters at the hospital. Mrs. Windhaus sustained the se- 
verest injuries. Her chest was crushed in by the falling 
building and one leg crushed. 

21 



322 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

CRAZED BY GRIEF. 

A pathetic iacident of the awful calamity came to the 
notice of the police when a patrolman took to the Sou- 
lard Street police station a young woman who, after view- 
ing the ruins of the house where her sister met death, be- 
came temporarily insane. 

She was found on the piles of the wreckage on Barry 
street, between Seventh and Eighth, calling out to God 
in His goodness to bring back to her her sister. 

The sight of a prettily-formed woman of not over 25 
years, dressed in deep black, with clasped hands lifted 
up to the sky, wailing at the fate the elements had vis- 
ited upon her sister and in an insane moment crying for 
her resurrection, drew a crowd about the place. 

She tore the planks and rubbish aside as if to build 
again the wrecked home, but in this she was stopped by 
the policeman, who took her to the station. 

An hour later she had regained her senses and was al- 
lowed to depart after leaving her name as Martha B. 
Wendell. She said she had come from Terre Haute to 
attend the funeral of her sister. 

A pig's souvenir. 

About the only thing left standing unharmed on the 
Island the day succeeding the storm was the row of Lov- 
ingston flats on A street. They are wooden structures, 
a,bojit ten in number, one story high, and are so situated 
tnat the wind seems to have sailed on its airy way above 
them. 






:i^^^ 



m ■ 



323 




324 



THE GRKAT CYCLONE. 325 

Some are inclined to believe that the cyclone over- 
looked the row in its haste, and did not have time to go 
back and pick it up. Perhaps it did not consider it 
worth while, as everything else was gone. 

Thirty -one tents were in use on the Island, and it was 
surprising to note the respectable appearance of several 
families who were occuping them. 

Sonje of them spoke cheerfully of the situation, and 
expressed an indefinite kind of a hope that they would 
come out all right. One old woman who had seen better 
days was not so well satisfied. Near by was standing a 
small house occupied by negroes. The roof- was off, but 
the vacancy was supplied by a tarpaulin. 

^'Look at them niggers!!' exclaimed the old woman. 
"Seems to me that they fare the best all the time." 

Running loose on the island was a drove of fine Berk- 
shire hogs. One of them carried with him a piece of tar 
roofing, which was blown squarely into his left shoulder. 
It protruded about eight inches, and though it shakes 
constantly with every movement of the muscles, the ani- 
mal did not seem to suffer pain. 

All attempts to capture the pig and remove the paper 
were futile. 

KILLED ON HIS WAY HOME. 

One of the saddest and most untimely deaths from the 
storm in East St. Louis was that of Harry F. Goodwin, 
a son of Editor J. West Goodwin, oftheSedalia " Bazoo." 

Young Goodwin was in his 21st year. His mother 
died ten years ago, and after that time he made his home 



326 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

with Lis uncle, Capt. James S. Whiclier, at De Hodia- 
mont, near St. Louis. 

A month ago Capt. Whicher and his wife moved to 
East St. Louis, but their stay was only temporary, as they 
intended to go to Indiana to live with their son. 

Young Goodwin had his possessions packed, and only 
a few hours after the storm he would have returned to 
his father's home in Sedalia to live. 

Capt. and Mrs. Whicher were both killed. Harry was 
caught in the wreck, and for five hours was pinioned down 
in such a position that he could move nothing but his 
hands and toes. 

A deep cut on the back of his head proved fatal, and 
he died after several hours of delirium. 

The body was taken in charge by his brother, Ben. J. 
Goodwin, a clerk in the Merchants -Laclede National 
Bank, St. Louis, who was with him when he died, and 
was shipped to Sedalia for interment. 

Mark Goodwin, another brother of the deceased, is a 
newspaper man at Denison, Tex. He formerly worked 
in St. Louis. 

CAPT. M. m'mAHOn's EXPERIENCE. 

There is no more competent police captain in St. Louis 
than Martin M'Mahon, who is a humorist and a philoso- 
pher as well as a first-class organizer and disciplinarian. 
It was at first feared he had been killed but he was not. 
Indeed no man worked harder the night after the storm 
and for days following to help the sufferers. A few 
yards east of the lake in Lafayette Park stands a rustic 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



327 



summer house with thatched roof supported by phiiii 
pine posts. Within a few feet of this fragile structure 
immense trees were uprooted and their branches torn into 
splinters, while the summer house remained untouched, 




THE SUMMER HOUSK IN IvAFAYETTE) PARK. 
(unharmed by the storm.) 

and stood in the same condition that it w^as before the 
storm. Everything else immediately around it was 
wrecked and ruined. During the storm Captain M'Ma- 



328 THE OREA.T CYCLONE. 

lion, wlio is in charge of the Police Station in Lafayette 
Park only a short distance to the south-east of this sum- 
mer house was at his post. The Captain says that when 
he got home after the storm he found his own house in 
ruins, and learned from the ladies of his family that 
during the height of the tornado they were all praying 
earnestly for protection when suddenly the roof was lifted 
from off their heads. While relating the incident the 
Captain smiled and seemed to think that perhaps the ladies 
prayed too hard. In other words they lifted the roof. 

A HUMOROUS INCIDENT. 

The disaster on the river was not without its humorous 
features. The ferryboat Andrew Christy, of the Wig- 
gins Ferry Company's fleet, was one of the many crafts 
that drifted helplessly down the stream and lodged 
against the eastern bank. Afterward, the steamer Belle 
of Calhoun and a wharf boat floated down, and, after 
bumping against the Christy, passed on. Several per- 
sons were on the wharf boat and a few on the ferryboat, 
among them the engineer. When the boats touched, 
some one on the wharfboat asked the engineer if he 
wanted to get off his boat. 

^'Yes. Wait till I get my dog," confusedly answered 
the engineer. 

He got the dog and managed to get on the wharfboat 
before it got by. 

THREW HLM A LIJE LINE. 

Harry Pence, a young millionaire from Minneapolis, 
had an experience during the storm, the memory of which 




320 




330 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 331 

lie will long retain. Mr. Pence had been cruising about 
the Gulf of Mexico in his j^acht Koamer. He was on his 
way home. He stopped at St. Louis to visit his cousin, 
Dr. Charles Ellis, the Dairy Inspector. Shortly before 
the storm he went in his yacht for a short cruise along 
the riv^er bank. When the storm was at its height he 
was opposite Carondelet. He ordered the captain to make 
for shore, but it was imposs'ble. In another instant Mr. 
Pence, who was on the promenade deck, was hurled in 
the air, and, after being tossed about by the wind, landed 
in the water. Some men on shore threw ropes to him, 
and, after some effort, landed him on terra firma. The 
yacht was caught a few blocks down the river. 

TALE OF TWO FAMILIES. 

The five persons composing the families of J. W. and 
J. L. Tinker, who were en route from Alabama to Wa- 
bashaw, Wis., had an experience on the river during the 
cyclone which they will always remember. They arrived 
on the steamer Mayflower, and at once secured passage 
on the Pittsburg, which, it will be remembered, was one 
of the boats that was so badly wrecked. When the tor- 
nado came down upon the river, the Pittsburg was tied 
up to the Diamond Jo wharf boat. The force of the wind 
blew the wharfboat from its moorings with the steamer 
far out into the current. There the steamer was exposed 
to the full force of the storm, and it was feared that she 
would go down every moment. The wharfboat was 
pounding her badly, and had it not been cut loose it 
would have torn a hole in the Pittsburg's hull. 



332 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

As the steamer passed out into tlie river all the state 
rooms on the starboard side were blown away, and the 
Tinkers were saved only by being dragged to the port 
side. It was not long until the state rooms on this side 
fell in, and all the members of the two families were 
more or less injured. All that remained of the staunch 
craft was the hull and floor of the cabin. The texas and 
pilot house had entirely disappeared and have not yet 
been found. Mrs. J. L. Tinker, who narrated the story, 
says that had it not been for the captain, she and all the 
others would have been killed. Almost every member 
of the crew deserted before the storm in its fury swept 
down, and the captain, too, was asked to leave, but re- 
fused. The boat drifted four miles down the river and 
grounded on an island, and at a late hour a tugboat came 
to the rescue and brought the imperiled passengers to the 
city. 

RESCUED BY AN OFFICER. 

There is an anecdote of the storm in which Detective 
Meaney played the leading role. He was at Eighteenth 
street and Ohio avenue, when the storm was heaviest. 
The building at 1806 Ohio avenue was tottering. The 
occupants on the second floor, Mrs. Gorman and two chil- 
dren, were screaming for assistance. Detective Meaney 
ran up the steps of the building and got the family to one 
side of a wall which he fio^ui-ed would be the safest. The 
tornado took the roof off the building and the debris fell 
immediately in front of them. The detective then took 
the children in his arm and carried them downstairs. He 



I 



THE GREAT CYCLONE.- 333 

then went after the mother and landed her safely on terra 
firma. All then went across the street and sought shelter in 
a solid building. Fifteen minutes thereafter the husband 
of Mrs. Gorman, who is a conductor on the Fourth street 
cable line, came home. His eyes moistened as he saw 
his home was demolished. He asked piteously of by- 
standers for the fate of his family. Detective Meaney 
went across the street to Mr. Gorman and pointed to the 
latter's wife and two children safe on the other side of 
the street. The husband wept in his joy and showered 
thanks and blessings upon Detective Meaney 

MRS. BENe's experience. 

The terrible ordeal throuo^h which Mrs. Lillie Bene, 
of 1418 Ohio avenue, passed is perhaps without 
a parallel among the entire list of cyclone sufferers. 
Her escape from death is most remarkable, but the 
wonder is that the poor woman has not lost her rea- 
son. One of her children was killed before her eyes, 
the other buried with her in the wreck of her home and 
seriously injured, while she, in addition to numerous 
wounds, narrowly escaped being roasted alive by the 
burning debris. 

Her husband, James Bene, is employed by the Emil 
Wachter Hardware Company, and when the tornado 
came she and her two little boys, Sylvester and Oliver, 
five and three years of age, respectively, were the only 
occupants of the residence. As the storm increased in 
fury she took the children and went into the middle room. 
Sylvester in his fright ran to the kitchen in the rear. A 



334 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

moment later he commenced to cry to his mother to come 
to him and she did so, only to see him struck by some 
flying debris and killed. She was too horror-stricken to 
think of her own safety, and as she advanced to pick up 
the little mangled body one of the walls fell and she and 
Oliver went down with the wreck to the floor below. 

Strange to say, she did not lose consciousness and at 
once tried to extricate herself. Her hands were free, but 
her body, which was bi'uised and bleeding, was pinned 
fast. So high was the wreckage piled above her that all 
was in total darkness. She tried to call for help but 
could not. Her mouth and nose were filled with dust 
and mortar to such an extent that she was almost suflPo- 
cated. With her fingers she removed the particles sufii- 
ciently to be able to breathe and then feebly cried for 
help. To add to the horror of her situation the timber 
beneath her legs commenced to burn, having caught fire 
from the stove of the kitchen on the ground floor. Had 
it not been for the mass of brick and mortar which was 
scattered about and which in a measure smothered the 
flames, she doubtless would have been burned to death 
before rescue came. Close to her lay the dead body of 
her little son and several times she managed to touch his 
face. Her baby, Oliver, was lying at a greater distance 
away, but by his cries she knew that he had escaped 
death. For over an hour the mother underwent this ter- 
rible ordeal before two of the neio^hbors heard her cries. 
It took them another hour to clear the timbers away. 
While they wei'e at work a fireman came and dragged 
Oliver from the wreck. Across his body was the dead 




335 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 337 

body of the little fellows pet dog — an Irish setter. The 
dog's body had shielded that of its master, and it was 
due to this fact that Oliver was not killed. 

Mrs. Bene was carried to the home of a neighbor. She 
was moved no less than three times before her ari'ival at 
St. John's. Her body was covered with cuts and bruises 
and her legs from the knees down are badly burned. 

A JOCKEY ON ICE. 

Jockey Kuhn, a rider at the South Side race track, was 
in the neighborhood of the track when the storm blew 
up and ran to the Union Depot Railway power house for 
protection. He says that he saw at least twenty people 
running toward the building, several of whom carried 
bicycles. Kuhn left there and ran to a butcher shop on 
Jefferson avenue and crawled into an ice chest. The Ger- 
man proprietor made fun of him for climbing into the 
box and called him a coward. When things began falling 
around the neighborhood the German himself made a 
dive for the ice chest. The jockey told him to stay out, 
as he was too brave to hide himself. The butcher 
thought otherwise, however, and climbed into the chest 
with Kuhn. 

CONTRIBUTED A $50 SUIT. 

A West End resident contributed his new $50 suit of 
clothes to the storm suflferers aojainst his will. A fashion- 
able coupe drove up to the Merchants' Exchange and a 
footman in livery brought a large bundle of clothing to 
the Eelief Committee headquarters. The bundle was not 
22 



338 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

opened, but, with several others, was dumped into a dis- 
tributing wagon. 

About an hour later the coupe drove up again and the 
footman, greatly excited, rushed in and asked for the 
bundle he had brought earlier in the day. When told 
that the bundle had been sent out his distraction knew no 
bounds. He said that his employer's new 150 suit of 
clothes had been placed in the bundle by mistake by the 
mistress of the house. The suit had just come from the 
tailor and the box containing it had not even been opened. 
As no record was kept of the clothes sent out, it was im- 
possible to recover the suit, and the footman left dejected. 
He declined to give the name of his employer. 

he'll never say die. 

As an illustration of the determination of the average 
East St. Louisan to overcome the destructive w^ork of the 
cyclone and an indication that the city will soon recover 
from the period of gloom that hung over it for a few 
days, the conduct of ex-Supervisor Patrick Kelly may be 
cited. 

Mr. Kelly at the time of the cyclone and many years 
previous, conducted the Kiverside Grocery, on the Levee. 
By thrift and strict attention to business he had acquired 
quite a competency, which he invested in the building of 
a row of frame buildings on the Island. 

The cyclone blew down all these buildings and left Mr. 
Kelly almost destitute. He, however, went to work after 
the storm had spent its fury and erected a shanty where 
his grocery formerly stood. 



THE grp:at cyclone. 339 

Dr. J. L. Wiggins, an old friend of his, happened to 
meet Mr. Kelly at his improvised store on Tuesday morn- 
ing, and while satisfied that things looked rather poorly, 
asked Kelly how he was getting along. 

"First rate," said Kelly. 

"How's that ?" asked the doctor. 

"Why, you see, doctor, " was the luckless man's re- 
sponse, "I have already doubled my stock. On Monday 
I started in with a box of soda, and now I have a box 
and a half and thirteen pies. I will pull out yet." 

PLUCKY GIRL. 

The ruling passion of one sorrowful little girl proved 
strong even when the tornado had left her without a 
home and with only the clothing she had on. She was 
found by an officer hovering near her wrecked home on 
Seventeenth and Geyer avenue industriously turning over 
bricks and debris in search of her school books. She 
was about to graduate in the Normal School and w^as 
fearful the loss of books, wliich she could scarcely afford 
to replace, Avould mean failure in examinations. 

A COINCIDENCE. 

During the fearful tornado a window over the altar of 
the Mount Calvary Episcopal Church was blown down. 
The window was placed there in memory of James B. 
Eads, the great engineer who built the famous bridge 
which bears his name. By a coincidence, the east por- 
tion of the bridge and the memorial window fell at the 
same moment. The window contained a picture of the 



340 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Savior, surrounded by a crown of thorns. Underneath 
was the inscription, "In memory of James B. Eads. 
Born May 23, 1820. Died March 8, 1887." It was the 
only memorial window in the church that was broken, 
and members of the congregation are commenting upon 
the occurrence, the massive bridge which was the engin- 
eer's greatest work, having suffered damage in the same 
storm. 

PINIONED IN DEBRIS. 

Martin Martell, proprietor of the Martell Hotel, East 
St. Louis, recovered from his injuries in a few days suffi- 
ciently to visit the wreck of his house, although so badly 
hurt that he was reported dead. A number of traveling 
men met him at the Relay, and after they had congratu- 
lated him upon his escape with life he told the fearful 
story of his escape. He said that when the first shock 
came he left his dining room and came out to the front 
room, facing the Relay. Here he met Judge A. W. 
Hope, of Alton, Judge Foulk, of Vandalia, and Messrs. 
William Flynn and John Mumme, of Edwardsville. 
Hope, Mumme and Flynn decided that they would run 
over the roads, while Mr. Martell and Judge Foulk con- 
cluded that it would be safer in the house. The three 
gentlemen had scarcely left the building when the house 
was razed. 

Martell does not know what occurred afterward to the 
others, but when he revived he was pinioned in such a 
way that his feet were elevated at an angle of probably 
forty -five degrees, while his head was pushed far up on 




i i 



341 




342 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 348 

his breast. He could not speak or see, but could hear 
and feel people passing over him in search for the dead 
at the back of the house. The fire had then started, and 
the horrors of a burning death confronted him. He was 
also further dumfounded to learn that several parties no- 
ticed him, but seeing that he was motionless, said that 
there was no use bothering with that dead man; let us go 
on and succor those who may be alive on the fire's side. 
In this way he believes at least fifty people passed over 
his body, all injuring him by tramping on the boards 
which bound him, and not one believing that he was 
alive. 

At last, by a superhuman effort, he chanced to move a 
foot as a rescuer walked along, and that movement no 
doubt saved his life. The man held his lantern down 
closer to the form, and realizing that the boot was not 
shaken by the breeze, he called for help, and soon extri- 
cated the semi-conscious ex-Treasurer of the City of East 
St. Louis. He was taken to the hospital immediately 
and tenderly cared for, and is now ready to commence 
the rebuilding of his place at the Relay. Judge Hope 
was also present last evening, and listened to Mr. Mar- 
tell's tale. He, too, had a trying experience at the door. 
He said the party had scarcely gained the outside when 
he was knocked down and lay upon the curbing near the 
railroad tracks. At that instant the house crashed in, 
and missiles of all kinds were piled up about him. He 
partly raised himself, and in that instant saw the roof of 
the Martell House and other large articles pass over his 
head and lodge near the Relay. Another instant, he was 



344 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

looking at a waste where a few seconds before stood fine 
brick and frame buildings, the Vandalia round house and 
other railroad property, all of which cut off a view of 
any part of the bridge. Now, however, he saw the 
structure in its entirety, and could not, on that account, 
realize his position. Seeing the bridge, he naturally con- 
cluded that it was he who had been blown away, and not 
the obstructions. Yet, turning again, he recognized the 
remains of the Relay Depot, and then for the first time 
he concluded that the storm had actually taken everything 
from the creek to the Levee, a distance of nearly a mile. 
The rain was pouring down in torrents, the thunder rolled, 
and the lightning momentarily lit up the heavens. Dur- 
ing the intervals, however, the darkness was intense. 
These flashes set out the whole panorama of destruction 
more vividly than if the light was continuous, and surely, 
he states, the scene was more terribly impressive. 

A barber's story. 

Upon the top floor of the Wainwright building there 
is a neat little barber shop, presided over by Louis Tisch, 
that has had lots of trade since the cyclone, because a 
great description of the tornado and its flight to the city 
is served up with every shave. With a haircut Tisch and 
his assistants point out different places of interest in the 
path of the storm, as they are seen from his elevated 
perch, and if a man takes a shave a haircut and a shampoo, 
maybe if he is good he can go out on the roof. 

The barbers in the Wainwright building, Tisch, G. C. 
Adams, John B. ITuppert and A. Rust, saw the storm 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 345 

from start to finish, and they tell a most remarkable story 
about it. They say it was not a funnel shaped cloud such 
as is commonly pictured as being the shape of a tornado. 
Each solemnly swears it was a horizontal black cloud that 
moved through the city with a twisting motion like a 
screw, faster than any railroad train that ever ran. Pre- 
ceeding the black cloud was a dense yellow cloud that 
looked as though its interior was a mass of flames. From 
out of this cloud shot long firey arms in every direction, 
and wherever one of these arms struck something went to 
pieces. 

Tisch compares the cloud to a big serpent that wriggled 
along up in the air and trust out a multi-forked tongue as 
though in anger. 

Shortly before the storm broke, Huppert went up on 
the roof and came back with the information that there 
was a tornado in sight. Rust followed him and came 
back with a confirmation of the report, and then the two 
barbers went out and saw the grand marshalling of the 
storm in the western skies. When the rain began, they 
came down into the shop, and the last they saw as they 
were coming through the scuttle was the advance guard 
of the tornado as it came in from the southwest. 

The barber shop is at the southeast corner of the build- 
ing, and all around it are little windows, round, like the 
port holes in a ship. The barbers stood at the south 
windows and watched the tornado from the time it ap- 
peared, away off to the southwest, until a portion of it 
rolled up against the building and made them wish they were 
somewhere else. Tisch says they saw houses and busi- 



346 THE GREAT CYCLONE, 

ness blocks go down before it, their view of the destruc- 
tion it was wreaking being made plain by the yellow 
clowd of fire that preceded the storm proper. He is 
sure it crossed the river some distance below Park avenue, 
switched around when it got nearly to the Illinois shore 
and started directly up the stream. In this he is borne 
out by the statements of the others who were watching it. 

Just as they were getting ready to move around to the 
east windows, in order to observe the passing of the 
storm up the river, a gust of wind and rain that shook 
the building came along, and they were in the midst of 
the storm. When next they saw the river and the city 
below, the storm had passed, and the rain was falling 
straight down. They saw dozens of wrecks floating down 
the stream, and on the other side saw all the steamboats 
blown away from the harbor and piled up along the 
bank. Then came the second storm, followed by the St. 
Louis Wooden Gutter Company's fire, which they saw 
from their airy observatory. It was late when they went 
down, after three hours' of uninterrupted excitement. 

A colored boy named Mose is one of the valued 
attaches of the shop, and he was one of the spectators 
when the awful cloud was first seen. He instantly 
started for the ground, and he got there in a hurry. He 
forgot about the elev^ators and made a slide, it is averred 
down ten flights of stairs. No amount of persuasion 
could get him back to the shop that night. Next morn- 
ing when he was being twitted about having run away 
from the storm, he remarked: 

"Oh there was others. " 




347 




348 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 349 

HER daughter's ASHES. 

Beat with age and with feeble steps an old lady hob- 
bled into Chief Harrigan's office at the Four Courts two 
days after the tornado, • carrying on her arm a market 
basket in which was a curious looking can or urn. Pov- 
erty had pinched the features of the aged woman and sor- 
row had left its deep lines. Secretary Espy was at his 
desk and he noticed the visitor and asked her what she 
desired. Her story was most pathetic, and the secretary 
was moved to pity at its recital. With hesitating words 
she stated her mission: 

"My name is Julia Weise, and I live at 416 Barton 
street. Two years ago my daughter, Mrs. Louis Sehr, 
died in Memphis, and this urn, which I have in my bas- 
ket, contains all that remains of her, after her body had 
been cremated. It was her last desire that her husband, 
Louis Sehr, should have her body cremated. For two' 
years he carried the ashes of his dead wife with him 
wherever he went. Some months ago he came to this 
city, a sufferer from consumption. He lived with me at 
416 Barton street, and did what he could to earn a liv- 
ing, though growing weaker every day. Finally he was 
compelled to remain in bed and for weeks he lingered, 
wasting away to a shadow. Wednesday he died, and I 
had not the means with which to bury him, so his body 
was taken to the Morgue, where it now is. 

"I am greatly in need of help,'' said the old woman, 
with quivering voice, "and I want Louis buried decently. 
He has a brother in TTtica, N. Y., Michael Sehr, a well-to- 
do barber, and if you could notify him of Louis' death 



350 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

and ask his assistance he might send money enough to 
pay for the funeral. " 

The old lady was told to come back at 4 o'clock in the 
afternoon. In the meantime, Chief Harrigan telegraphed 
to the brother in Utica, stating the circumstances, and 
asking if he would defray the expenses of the burial. 

The urn containing the ashes of Mrs. Weise's daughter 
remained in the Chiefs office all day. The old woman 
left it there for safe-keeping. She had no special place 
to stay, and is afraid she will lose the urn. It was the ob- 
ject of much curiosity on the part of attaches of the 
office and visitors on account of its peculiar shape. 
It is made of heavy tin and has a screw top, which can 
be removed at will. The ashes weigh about five pounds 
and are of a light straw color. 

A MAN LOST HIS REASON. 

At the old police station in East St. Louis, the officers 
wrestled with a man who said his name was Thomas Phil- 
lips. Phillips was picked up while aimlessly walking 
about the railway yards and lodged in the station. As 
soon as he was brought in he displayed unmistakable 
signs of insanity, and attempted to make a break for lib- 
erty. He contended that the officers wished to murder 
him on account of the part he had taken in the late tor- 
nado, and as he was a man of standing he would sell his 
life dearly. The next instance he quieted down and said 
that his name was Thomas Phillips; that he lived at 
Greenville, Mo., but afterwards held that he had just ar- 
rived from Canada. As soon as he was placed in the 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. • 351 

cell he fought desperately for freedom. Several police- 
men i*an to the assistance of the turnkey and the man was 
finally overpowered. 

He then paced up and down the corridor and de- 
nounced in unmeasured terms the action of the police in 
firing at him so often. The police believe that the poor 
fellow is a victim of the storm. Some claim that he was 
seen on the streets a few days ago, and if he is the same 
person something since has caused him to become de- 
mented. He is a fine looking fellow, tall and stout, with 
light hair, sandy mustache and blue eyes. His hands do 
not indicate that he is a laborer, and in his lucid mo- 
ments he uses language with characterizes him as a man 
of fair education. 

BATTLE OF THE WINDS. 

H. D. Sexton, the wealthy real estate owner, Vice- 
President of the East St. Louis Electric Railway, and di- 
rector in the Workingman's Bank, had a narrow escape 
in the storm, and gives a graphic account of ''The Battle 
of the Winds,'' as he terms it. 

Mr. Sexton, with his stenographer. Miss Rose Taylor, 
Cashier Isch of the Workingman's Bank and several 
others were sitting in his ofiice on Broadway when the 
skirmish line of the infuriated elements hove in sight. 
They started to go home, but saw that they would be 
overtaken on the way and concluded to wait awhile. 

For a time they tried to hold the front door shut, but 
the glass in the broad window crashed in and stampeded 
them. They dodged under tables and desks, and Mr, 



352 THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 

Sexton says that above the roar of the winds he could 
hear some very audible and fervent prayers. A telephone 
pole broke just in front of the office, and was shot straight 
as an arrow against the wall, knocking a hole in it, and 
added to this the terror-stricken occupants could hear the 
roof crackling and falling above them. 

They dared not venture out, so lay prone upon the 
floor, expecting the worst, but when the storm had spent 
its force, all rose, shook the wet mortar from their clothes 
and ventured out. 

Mr. Sexton says that for fully ten minutes before the 
storm reached East St. Louis he stood in his office and 
watched the grand elemental display that was playing 
such havoc in South St. Louis. 

He said at times the heavens seemed to brighten and 
he could see the storm moving northward at a rapid rate. 
He expected it to reach the East Side, but for the moment 
his attention was turned to a terrific gust of wind that 
came from the north. 

The contending forces were advancing to meet each 
other, and they did with terrible force just about at the 
Eads bridge. Nothing but such combined force could 
have shaken and crumbled a span of the great bridge, is 
Mr. Sexton's opinion. 

The south wind was the stronger, but the brief figfc 
the north wind gave it was deadly and terrific. Bot, 
aimed their wanton forces upon the defenseless victim, 
on the Levee and upon the railroad warehouses in thav 
section. That is why the result was so calamitous. The 
south wind, in its maddened triumph, swept on with ter- 




353 




354 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 355 

rible zeal and devastated every obstacle that human hand 
had raised to impede its march of destruction, and spared 
not life itself. 

''It was indeed a battle of the winds," continued Mr. 
Sexton, ''and as a common enemy. East St. Louis will 
wear its scars for years to come. 

FAMILIES BROKEN UP. 

John Bergeest, driver for the Louis Ottenad Furniture 
Co., at 1700 South Broadway, leaves a wife with a you.ng 
boy and girl, who are suddenly cast upon the sea of ad- 
versity, with no means of support. He was by an open 
window trying to quiet his team when the building col- 
lapsed and his body was not found until Friday evening. 

William Ottenad, president of the 'Ottenad Furniture 
Co., was in the office at the rear of the store when it col- 
lapsed and was instantly killed. His family consists of 
his wife and seven children, ranging in age from one 
week to eight years. Mrs. Ottenad is very low, indeed, 
and her death is momentarily looked for. The deceased 
left no estate, his all being in the furniture he had in 
stock. 

Mary Rux is the only surviving member of the family 
which lived at 716 Barry street. There were in the 
building at the time her mother, Matilda Rux, 56, 
her sister, Jennie, 17, and Tina, 16, and a friend, John 
Labien, aged 49. All were sitting in the front room 
when the first blast came and it almost lifted the house 
from its foundation. Mary jumped through the door 
and escaped by the narrowest margin. All four of the 



356 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

Others were killed instantly. The survivor is 19 years 
of age and self-supporting. 

A TERKIBLE SCATTER. 

John W. Dunn, Assistant City Treasurer, tells a re- 
markable story that he dug up while visiting the cyclone 
district near Lafayette Park. A driver for an ice wagon 
was last seen entering an alley back of the power house 
of the People's Railway Company, seated on his wagon 
with his whole outfit intact. Later he was missing, and 
for hours nothing was known of him. Mr. Dunn says 
that the entire outfit was discovered, the wagon in one 
place, the horse in another, and the driver in another. 

They were at the three angles of a triangle, and Mr. 
Dunn is authority for the statement that they were 100 
yards apart. It is impossible to explain how the driver 
was blown from the seat, or the horse separated from the 
wagon, but the facts Mr. Dunn says, are as stated above. 

A MAN AND WOMAN BLOWN AWAY. 

Architect Isaac S. Taylor tells of a dramatic scene 
which he viewed from his oflice on the ninth floor of the 
Columbia Building, at Eighth and Locusts streets. Mr. 
Taylor says that soon after the storm broke, a man and 
woman turned into Eiglith street from Locust. As soon 
as the rain began to fall the man put up an umbrella. 
When the speed of the wind increased both of them 
sought the railing around the Custom House, with the 
umbrella still up. The latter was soon wiped out by the 
gale, and then the man and woman were seen desperately 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 357 

clinging to the iron railing. The fury of the gale in- 
creased from forty to fifty, sixty, seventy miles an hour. 
There was a moment of darkness as the wind blew furi- 
ously, and the man and woman were still clinging to the 
rail. In another minute the street lit up and they had 
entirely disappeared. Mr. Taylor says he does not know 
what became of the couple, but there is no doubt they 
were swept tlown Eighth street by the wind, and it is 
probable they will figure ev^entually among the number 
of missing persons who have not been accounted for since 
the storm. 

HORSE RESCUED ALIVE. 

Workmen on the ruined Strickler Building came upon 
a live horse Sunday night after the wreck. The poor 
animal was freed from its predicament some time during 
the day. 

The Strickler Building was one of the worst used by 
the storm of any of the structures in East St. Louis. It 
was absolutely razed to the ground and at least four peo- 
ple killed. Among those who lost their lives there were 
Special Tax Collector Sage and his wife, Phil Strickler, 
the driver, and Dr. C. E. Mill, perhaps the most promi- 
nent victims of the disaster. 

There was a horse stabled in the basement. He used 
to draw one of Strickler's grocery wagons. After the 
building fell and people began to think again, some of 
them remembered the poor animal, but thought, of course, 
he must be dead, covered as lie was by the great mass of 
debris. The workmen had been laboring ever since to 



358 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



get tlie wreck cleared away with a view to finding any 
more dead bodies that might be there. 

Sanday night they heard sounds indicating that some- 
thins: was aliv^e somewhere in the debris. Great excite- 




KAST ST. LOUIS EI^UCTRIC CAR BI,OWN FROM THE BRIDGE. 

ment followed this discovery. Lal^ored breathing could 
be heard, and the sound of something struggling as 
though to get freed from the crushing weight. 



1 
1 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 359 

Efforts were redoubled by the men. They felt sure 
they were about to come upon some poor torn and bleed- 
ing man or woman, but when the last stick was lifted the 
dirty nose of the horse was seen. 

In some miraculous way the animal seemed to be in 
pretty fair spirits. A bridge of timbers had formed over 
him in such a manner as to keep him from being mashed 
to death. Monday morning a quantity of oats was let 
down to the lucky prisoner and a bucket of water was 
sent after it. The poor creature was famished and ate 
and drank ravenously. 

Great care was exercised by the men to prevent the props 
from tumbling out, and the horse was finally gotout unhurt. 

it's an ill wind. 

The luckiest man in East St. Louis is A. M. Meintz. 
The tornado actually did him good instead of harm and 
that without any injury to his fellow-townsmen or at 
their expense in any way. 

Meintz is a very wealthy man and also a very shrewd one. 
He owns a two-story buikling at Third street and Missouri 
avenue. Recently he decided to add an extra story to it 
and was just getting ready to remove the root' for tliis pur- 
pose when along came the cyclone and took it off for him. 

Meintz is one of the few men in East St. Louis who 
had tornado insurance. His losses are entirely covered 
in this way and he saved the expense of getting ready for 
his third-story addition. 

He is going right on with his plans and workmen are 
now busy putting on the third story. 



360 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

TYPICAL SADNESS. 

One of the most pitiable cases seen at relief headquar- 
ters was that of Mrs. August Brauer and ^ve of her six 
children. 

Until the storm they lived at 500 Broadway. Their 
house was torn down completely. Mr. Brauer was so 
badly bruised that he could not walk, and Philip, 8 years 
old, had a leg broken. 

How the other members of the household escaped is a 
marvel. 

Not a single article of furniture was saved and all of 
their clothing was lost. 

To add to their misfortune the baby was badly bruised 
on the head and has since become sick because of the 
weather. 

The family found temporary shelter with Mr. Brauer's 
sister, Mrs. Andrew Peterson, whose husband is a mem- 
ber of the East St. Louis Fire Department. 

A WILD AND AWFUL RIDE. 

Two maddened horses racing south on Jefferson ave- 
nue, dragging behind them a "trouble wagon" of the 
Union Depot Street Railway Company, with two fright- 
ened men clino;inor to the rails on the elevated tower 
which rests on the bed of the wagon, was one of the scenes 
witnessed. 

The wagon had gone to 2313 South Jefferson avenue 
to repair a broken trolley wire. The wagon had driven 
into the tracks. The tower was elevated so that the two 
men on top could be in easy reach of the trolley wires. 



THF. GRT^AT CYCLONE. S6l 

After the wagon was in place and the two men were at 
work on the wires the driver left his seat to go to the side- 
walk. He had hardly reached the ground when the wind 
blew a paper in front of the horses. They became fright- 
ened and started on a dead run down the avenue. One 
of the men in the tower had his hand in the ropes about 
the trolley wire and his arm was nearly jerked off. 

Both men screamed, but that only seemed to urge the 
horses to greater speed. 

So high was the tower that the rails nearly caught in 
the overhead wires, and a dozen times the endancrered 
men stooped and crawled to the floor of the high platform 
to keep their heads from being severed from their bodies. 

Men who were blocks down the street' saw the team 
coming and realized the jeopardy in which the men's lives 
were put on the tower and they rushed frantically into 
the car tracks, some pulled their coats from their backs 
and waved them in the air in an effort to stop the horses, 
but that only made them turn from the tracks and the 
wheels, in gliding against the rails, nearly overturned 
the top- heavy vehicle. 

Finally one of the two men who had been dodging elec- 
tric wires and bouo;hs of trees scaled the rail and while 
the horses were going the fastest lowered himself down 
the tower until his feet touched the bed of the wagon. 
Then he sprang to the ground and rolled over into the 
gutter. 

The horses made for the car sheds and dashed into one 
of the car doors. The tower with the man on it struck 
the top of the door and it was torn loose from the bed 



36f^ 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



and toppled over to the sidewalk. The man jumped and 
struck in the street, sustaining nothing more than a sprain 
of tlie ankle. 



THE WIND S IDIOSYNCRACY. 



The twister fairly out-twisted itself when it demolished 
Mt. Calvary Churcli at Jefferson and Park avenues. The 




SCliNL, 



V.ilOLiiiAi. Asiv.NLJv 



belf r y was on the northeast corner of the building before 
the storm. Afterwards it wasn't. The tornado struck 
the church and carried the roof up into the air. While 
it was up there the walls gave way. Then the roof turned 
end for end and dropped on the ruins, covering them 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 363 

completely. When the storm had passed it was found 
that the belfry was on the south end of the building ex- 
actly opposite its former position. 

Down on Iowa avenue the tornado deposited a large 
telegraph pole in a place where telegraph poles are not 
usually seen. The owner of a house in the neighborhood 
had been repairing a chimney early in the afternoon and 
had left the scuttle-hole leading to the roof from the sec- 
ond story porch uncovered. 

The tornado saw its opportunity and seized it. 

It picked up a telegraph pole in front of the house, 
carried it over the roof and set it down squarely in the 
scuttle-hole. The pole was there for several days after 
the storm, its base resting on the porch and the cross- 
arms protruding through the opening in the roof of the 
porch. 

HOW THE BIRDS FARED. 

A dead robin was picked up in Lafayette Park. On 
one side the bird was intact. On the other every feather 
was gone. It was "naked as a picked bird," to use a 
familiar expression. 

Instances have been recorded of the dove, the most 
timid of birds, seeking refuge with man when in great 
peril. Such an incident inspired the writing of the hymn, 

'•Jesus, lover of my soul, 
Let me to thy bosom fly." 

A dove pursued by a hawk flew into an open window 
and into the bosom of John Wesley. It was that which 
inspired him to write one of the most widely known 
hymns of the century. During the storm a similar inci- 



364 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

dent occurred. A number of people liad taken refuge in 
the large corridor of the Union Trust Building. A snow 
white dove, unable to cope with the wind in its native 
element, equally unable to find security on any resting 
place exposed to the wind, blown hither and thither, in 
its fright entered the open doorway and flew to the 
shoulder of a gentleman standing there. The friglitened 
bird seemed to know it was safe, and sat there quite and 
contented. 

Henry J. Ruck, who lives at Thirteenth and Geyer, 
had a red bird and thereby hangs a tale. Before the storm 
the caoe containino; the bird huno; on a nail on the back 
porch. Most of the porch was carried away. Mr. Ruck, 
in the general confusion, forgot all about the bird. An 
hour after the storm he looked out of the front window. 
The cage was lodged in the telegraph wires in front of the 
house and the red bird was singing gaily as if to say, 
"never touched me." 

SOME CURIOrS EFFECTS. 

Until repairs were commenced, the curious effects of the 
wind on certain objects was a source of much comment. 
At 1914 South Broadway, was J. B. Steffen's furniture 
store, which occupied a three-story brick building on the 
east side of the street. When the wind struck there it 
shaved off the entire front wall of the third story, but dis- 
criminated at the second. On each side close to the side 
walls, wa? a full length window with large panes of glass, 
one to the sash. All the rest of the front of that floor is 
gone, but these two windows are still in their places, the 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 365 

frames intact, and the glass not even cracked. The win- 
dow to the south was evidently opened slightly at the 
bottom, as the drawn curtain behind it has been stained 
as if by rain, but otherwise no damage whatever was done 
to it. 

The very tall steeple and its prototype of a minaret, 
which tower above the Catholic Church of SS. Peter and 
Paul at Eighth and Allen avenue, must have been lined 
with steel to have withstood the shocks as well as they 
did. The intermediate roof between them was badly 
wrecked, most of the debris falling into the body of the 
chui'ch, and the very steep roof of the east tower was also 
torn up very considerably. That the main roof should 
have been so damaged while the spires escaped is the more 
remarkable, as the church lies east and west, the direction 
of the storm's path, and hence the roof was to a very large 
extent protected by the two spires. 

One of the out-of-place objects seen hanging to one of 
the spikes of Lafayette Park fence was a new spring bon- 
net. It was not claimed. 

A coat and vest from some unknown source came sail- 
ing through the air and landed on the corner of St. Ange 
and Park. A negro soon after the storm appropriated 
the garments and was seen to abstract a "roll" from the 
vest pocket. No inquiry was made after for either 
clothes or money. 

At one house a shirt was found under the back cellar 
door. As the cellar door was fastened down the only 
way the shirt could have got there was by blowing 
through the front cellar window. It was made for a man 



366 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



as big in girth as Grover Cleveland, and as the newspa- 
per man is a light weight, the find did not profit him. 
He also acquired three trees, an old rug and an empty 
chicken coop, which latter was identified as the property 
of a butcher near the City Hospital, a block away. 
On St. Ange avenue, from Park to Carroll, not a house, 




UNION DAIRY COMPANY. 



save one, escaped damage, many being entirely wrecked. 
All of them were occupied but one, and, strange to say, 
the empty house was the one which escaped. It was only 
slightly damaged by falling bricks from a chimney next 
door. 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 367 



A POOU REFUGE. 



Very embarrassing was the plight of three ladies who 
were on an open car of the Fourth street cable when the 
storm came up. For want of a better refuge they re- 
mained where they were. But when the unprincipled 
wind began to take unwarranted liberties they braved it 
and sought cover. The wind got into their big sleeves 
and blew out their skirts like balloons, until seams be- 
gan to rip ominously and presently sections of garments 
were carried bodily away. It got to a poijt when to re- 
main longer meant that they would be unclothed entirely, 
and they escaped while there was yet time. But in those 
awful few minutes even Peeping Toms had something 
else to indulge their prying propensities, and the ladies, 
had no cause to blush. 

CRAWLED UNDER THE BRIDGE APPROACH. 

The Purina mills, Kobinson cfe Danford, proprietors, 
situated just south of the Twelfth street bridge, was the 
scene of many narrow escapes. The full working force 
were in the mill at the time, including two young women 
who were in the third story. When the upper portion of 
tlie mill went down the employes ran out and crawled 
under the approach of the bridge, where it kept them 
busy dodging boards from the elevator on the east and 
brick from their own building, which were carried under 
the bridge with great force. The two young women in 
the third story did not get out until the roof had fallen, 
but fortunately they made their way safely to the bridge 
approach, where they also found refuge from the warring 



368 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

elements." A pony which was tied in the stable back of 
the mill, after the storm was found cutting all kinds of 
didos, and could not be pacified until Mr. Robinson found 
in its stall an elevator belt chain about 9 feet long which 
had been blown in from the elevator east of the bridge, 
a distance of about 400 yards. When the chain was re- 
moved the pony became quiet. 

ALOXE WITH HER BABY. 

Mrs. L. Schnute, who lived at 838 Gratiot street, was 
alone with her baVje. Their two-story residence is a com- 
plete wreck down to the first floor, furniture and all. Mrs. 
Schnute took her babe when she saw the storm coming 
and stood in the hallway close to the door. Where she 
stood is a space about 6 feet long and 5 feet wide not 
molested by the wreckage. Anywhere else in the build- 
ing they would have been killed. Mrs. Schnute says she 
owes her rescue to James Stevens and Ed. Scanlon, the 
latter a watchman for the S. N. Long Syrup Company. 
Mr. Scanlon was blown from the third story of the S. N. 
Long Syrup Company building and the soles of his shoes 
torn from his feet; otherwise he was not injured, and is 
credited with many noble deeds of rescue. 

MRS. AVORHEIDE's EXPERIENCE. 

Ever since the cyclone Mrs. Fred. Worheide has been 
wondering how she and her two children escaped death. 
Her home is just across the street from St. Henry's 
Church, corner of Hickory street and California avenue, 
which was so badly wrecked. She and her little son and 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 860 

daughter, 5 and 7 years of age respectively, were on the 
second floor when the cyclone swept down upon the resi- 
dence. The entire second story was lifted up and carried 
away and a rnoment later her little girl was drawn away 
by the force of the wind and dropped upon the debris on 
the street. Mrs. AVorheide and her son escaped with 
slight injuries, but the little girl, it is feared, may not re- 
cover. 

Mrs. Worheide says the wind seemed to hold her fast, 
while her little daughter, who was standing only a few 
feet from her, was blown upon the street. Judging from 
this, it is thought there must have been several twisting 
counter winds sweeping through the building. 

AN ADVENTUROUS AND COSTLY RIDE. 

Ferdinand F. Herold, of the Herold Livery Co., No. 
1717 Park avenue, sent Mr. Jerome Hill a bill for $155 
for a carriage on the night of the cyclone. 

''I did not charge half what I should," said Mr. Her- 
old. ' ' I am a wreck myself and two horses are ruined. 
I went off and left my family in the woodshed and one of 
my men is half crazy. I would not go through it again for 
11,000. 

^'Mr. Hill came to me fiv^e times and begged -me to 
hitch up and take his family down to the hotel. The 
office was full of injured people, Avaiting to be taken 
home. Mr. Hill tried to get Mr. Keyes to take him 
down and Mr. Keyes told him he would not hitch up for 
any amount of money. 

"Finally Mr. Hill asked me if I would hitch up if lie 
24 



370 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 



got a lantern. He offersd a man across the street $10 
for a lantern before he got one. I hitched up myself and 




EAST OF LAFAYRTTK PARK. 



had to drive over the sidewalks most of the way, and 
I had to walk ahead and cut wires or lift them 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 371 

up every few steps. I cut thousands of wires with 
pincers, and some I had to cut with a chisel. All this 
time 1 was wringing wet. On. the way down to the hotel 
we were stopped every block by the police, Avho told us 
we could not go on. I told them not to bother me, that 
we could go on, and I did go through where it was thought 
no one could pass. I was wet all this time and shivering 
with the cold, and it was just as bad coming back. I left 
one man, his name is Gustav, on the other end of the 
Eighteenth street bridge. He is out of his head yet, and 
I don't know if he will ever get well again. 

"Mr. Hill asked me to get him to the hotel, no matter 
what it cost, and I did it, and the bill I sent him is a 
very moderate one. I would not go through it again for 
any amount of money." 

BROKE UP A WEDDING. 

On Wednesday, May 27, a marriage license was issued 
from the office of the County Clerk at Belleville to Rob- 
ert R. Haig of Casey vi lie and Miss Eliza Collins of Birk- 
ner. 

The wedding was to have taken place that evening and 
the wedding party was assembled at the home of the 
bride, when the mighty wind swept down the hillside 
and scattered death and desolation on every hand. 

The Collins home, like all the rest, went down, and 
many of the wedding guests were injured, including the 
sister of the bride, but the bridal couple escaped without 
a scratch. 

They were taken to Belleville on the special train and 



372 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

sheltered by friends, and the thought of marriage was 
temporarily put out of their minds. 

When the expectant groom again bethought him of the 
license, the precious document could not be found. The 
wind which broke up the wedding party had made its 
work complete by carrying away the legal warrant for it. 
The couple went to Belleville later and a duplicate was 
issued to them without extra cost. 

EIGHTY- FIVE MILES. 

There were just 85 miles of streets obstructed by debris 
as a result of the tornado. All of these streets were 
cleaned up in 10 days. In St. Louis there are 480 miles of 
improved streets, so it can be seen to what extent the 
tornado interrupted traffic. The storm district, on its 
outside lines, extended from the river on the east to 
Tower Grove avenue on the west, and from Olive street 
on the north to Lynch street on the south. The extreme 
limits were three miles east and west and two miles north 
and south. 

An adequate idea of the damage can be formed when 
it is stated that if all the houses damaged and blown down 
were on both sides of one street, that street would just be 
85 miles long. This figure is given by the Street Com- 
missioner, who has been through the entire district, and 
from the reports of his general superintendent, who has 
cut a roadway through the 85 miles of streets. 

In addition to this, there were many more streets ob- 
structed by wires and the like, which are not counted in 
the total, as the obstruction was but slight. These streets 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 37o 

were cleaned up roughly the first day. It took just three 
days to cut out a passage through the debris so that traf- 
fic could be resumed. As 1,000 men were employed at 
this work, the magnitude of the task can be realized. 
There are 90 alleys obstructed. These alleys represent 
about 20 miles. The street gangs are now engaged in 
cutting a passage way through these alleys. It is a very 
difficult task, as in some of them there are three and four 
feet of brick and other debris. 

The work of repairing and rebuilding in the wrecked 
district was pushed as rapidly as possiV)le. The force of 
the Building Inspector's ofifice worked with all its vim to 
see that unsafe buildings are properly and promptly re- 
paired. No permit to reconstruct or repair demanded. 
The inspectors were simply seeing that the work is done 
substantially and safely. No one was asked to show a 
permit. Official red tape was tabooed. 

A RIDE ON THE AVIND. 

On Thursday, following the great storm in St. Louis, 
there was found on a farm in the northwestern part of 
Fayette county, 111., a piece of tar roofing paper fully a 
yard square. Sixteen miles west of Vandalia, near 
Smithsboro, a photograph of two young girls, presum- 
ably sisters, bearing the name of a St. Louis photog- 
rapher, was found in William Defree's door yard the 
next morning after the storm. As St. Louis lies in a 
southwesterly direction, and the course of the storm being 
from the southwest to northwest, it is very probable that 
these articles were carried that distance by the wind. 



374 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



A KINDLY DEED. 

A pathetic story and a generous action came to notice. 
Mr. Sanford Snyder, 65 years old, who at one time was 
quite well-to-do, but of late years has suffered reverses of 
fortune, was coming home on a Sixth street car the even- 
ing of the storm, from Carondelet, where he liad been 




ADVANCK EI^EYATOR "B," EAST ST, I^OUIS. 

seeking employment. The car was at Eighth and Hick- 
ory when the storm struck, and everyone on the car was 
more or less injured, Mr. Snyder being knocked insens- 
i]>le. Someone carried him to the sidewalk, where he 
lay in the driving rain for sometime. Finally recovering 
consciousness he returned to his home in a pitiable condi- 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 375 

tion, oaly to fiad it destroyed, and his wife huddled in 
a corner of the only room in the house which had not 
been wiped out of existence. Since then they have had 
a severe struggle to exist. Their condition was learned 
by a conductor on the Laclede avenue line, who immedi- 
ately appealed to his fellow employes for help in reliev- 
ing the aged couple. A sum of money was quickly 
raised and taken to Mr. Snyder, where it was joyfully re- 
ceived. Mr. Snyder and wife w^ere still living in the 
ruins of their former home at 1227 Merchant street. 

ANOTHER LUCKY ESCAPE. 

The mangled bodies of a large number of the people 
taken from the ruins tell plainer than words the horrible 
manner in which death was met, but at the same time a 
number of the escapes made by citizens are as mii'aculous 
as the deaths terrible. Each survivor of the tornado has 
a story to tell, and chief among them isTimO'Connell, a 
track walker on the Belt Line, who is spending his spare 
time in thanking fortune that he and the members of his 
family were born beneath lucky stars. O'Connell was 
walking along the Belt Line track when the tornado 
caught him. The tornado lifted him into the river. As 
O'Connell fell he caught a rope which was attached to a 
pier, and managed to hold on in safety while the storm 
blew overhead. 

At the home on North Missouri avenue were Mrs, 
O'Connell and her four children. AVhen the storm struck 
the place it carried everything away, and left the family 
unscathed. 



376 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

THE CHINESE AND THE STORM. 

Little, if any, mention was made of the Chinese who 
were injured or the loss of property they sustained. No 
less than seven were injured, one of them seriously, while 
the loss to their laundries alone will, it is said, amount 
to more than $3,000. The more fortunate members of 
the race have not been idle, however. They are not only 
taking care of their sufferers, but have raised $100 for 
the benefit of other unfortunates. 

Wong Chin Foo, the well-known interpreter, stated 
that a meeting of the Chinese merchants was held and 
measures were at once taken to alleviate their country- 
men's sufferings. The injured were given medical attention 
by Chinese physicians, while those who lost their propert}^ 
have received substantial assistance financially. They 
had little difficulty in raising the II 00 for all other vic- 
tims of the storm. 

HEXRY WEDERMEYEr's EXPERIENCE. 

Henry Wedermeyer, of 911 AVarren street, a switch- 
man in the employ of the Wabash Railroad Company, 
was at work in the yard of that company when the storm 
began. *' About half -past 5 o'clock," said Mr. Weder- 
meyer, "I went over to the buildings of the Belcher 
Sugar Refinery and climbed in a tank in one of the old 
sheds to take refuge from the storm. As I stood there 
pieces of flying boards and broken glass fell all around 
me. While looking south I saw the cupola of the St. 
Louis elevator and the biggest part of the roof blown off. 
The old ])uildings of the Belcher Sugar Refinery, between 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 377 

Dixon and Ashley and Lewis and Main streets, were 
nearly entirely unroofed. The conveyors, about eight in 
number, on the river house of the St. Louis elevator were 
partly destroyed, and the top of the building where they 
weigh and shift the grain from one bin to another, was 
blown off. The smokestack on the St. Louis elevator 
w^as demolished. The St. Joe House, on Lewis street, 
between Ashley and Biddle, was totally unroofed and the 
gable end of the building was blown in. A box car on 
the Merchants' Elevator tracks, foot of MuUanphy street, 
w^as blown off the track and landed on its side. The 
Merchants' elevator building was also unroofed and badly 
damaged. The steamboats Polar Wave, Benton, Char- 
lotte Boeckler and Jack Frost, lying between Smith and 
O'Fallon streets, were damaged, and the pilothouses and 
smokestacks being blown off and the sides demolished." 

UNEASINESS OF SHANTY -BOAT OWNERS. 

Where are the fishermen and others who occupied the 
boat houses in the beach just below the elevator? was a 
standing question on the Island after the cyclone. It is 
known that there were twenty or more of these boats on 
the bank, many of which came in when the river wa^ at 
its height. Few were known, as they had come from a 
distance, and, finding a good harbor south of the eleva- 
tor, anchored their crafts. On the morning after the 
storm all of these late arrivals had disappeared, and the 
denizens of that locality now believe that the boats were 
swept into the water and the occupants were drowned. 
These boats were not as high up under the shelter of the 



378 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



elevator as the others, which naay explain their loss; 
while the old-timers weathered the storm without a single 
fatality, and with little loss. No inquiries have been re- 
ceived at headquarters for lost fishermen or persons who 




WRKCK OF EmVATOR ON THE. LEVEE. 



follow the liver in boat houses for a living, but the resi- 
dents of Sandy Hook firmly believe that when these 
people fail to write from the points along the shore des- 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 379 

ignated by their friends, in the same manner as Gipsey 
letters are forwarded, a general howl will go up from dlL*- 
ferent ports and a full investigation will be made. Few 
people can form any estimate of the vast number of per- 
sons who are born and reared in these two-room shanty 
boats. Every great city has its Little Oklahoma, and 
many smaller ones its Sandy Hooks. 

All do not fish for a living, Many are first-class me- 
chanics, and go from one town to another in dull seasons. 
They live cheaply on. the water and pay no rents for 
land. A few are known who make fair livings selling 
fancy work; while others are gamblers and saloon-keepei\>^. 
The estimate of the loss of twenty boats, with their in- 
mates, is not considered too Uirge by some persons; but 
there is no authentic record of the swamping of any of 
them. All may have silently left the mooring and crept 
down the stream to a better hiding place, even after the 
storm, unnoticed by any one. 

STRANGE FREAKS OF THE WIND. 

The wind played strange freaks. 

A horse was lying dead on the track beside the loco- 
motive of the wrecked Chicago and Alton train. ^Tt 
seems to me," said a railroad man, "as if he had 
killed himself trying to help the locomotive pull the 
train out." 

In the worst part of the wreck of the upper Louisville 
and Nashville offices a dog lived to bark his delight at 
being released from the chain which kept the wind from 
blowing him away. 



880 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

One of the dead horses on the Island roadway was 
apparently stabbed to death with splinters. 

A stable which stands in the roadway was pinned 
through the corners by wooden beams, which were forced 
into both sides by the wind. The ends of the beams, 
extending up and out from the stable, contained a pile of 
lumber carefully arranged, as if placed there by hand. 

A TRUNK MYSTERY. 

The police were worried by a trunk, which was fished 
out of the river at the foot of Elwood street, on the night 
of the storm by John Gamache, residing at 5901 South 
Broadway. A quantity of woman's clothing, some 
dresses, evidently belonging to a little girl, a child's pic- 
ture and a large number of letters make up the contents 
of the trunk. The letters are addressed to Miss Emma 
Boyle and nearly all of them are signed J. W. Rice. They 
are written on letterheads of the Moser Hotel, St. Louis, 
the Ringo Hotel of Mexico, Mo., the Grant House of 
Rolla, Mo. , and some are on plain paper. The address, 
3531 Olive street, appears in one letter. In others Rice 
requests the recipient to address him at Post Office Sta- 
tion F. 

One of the letters is signed by Charles Boyle, and from 
its contents it is evident tliat the "Miss" Emma Boyle in 
question is his wife. The letter is remarkable for the ex- 
traordinary spelling of several words. "Answer," for in- 
stance, is spelt in the delightfully original manner, ' 'ancer." 
The writer refers to himself as having been a "devorsed" 
man, and dechires that he loves Emma as "mutch" to-day 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 381 

as he ever did. This letter opens with the single word 
"Mildred." It was evidently written by Boyle to a 
woman whose first name he uses in opening. Apparently 
she gave the letter to the owner of the trunk, who is 
thought to be the Emma Boyle before mentioned. In 
this communication, Boyle discusses at length his wife's 
actions and certain threats which she had made about leav- 
ing him. He declares himself at a loss to account for her 
coldness and says he has always treated her right. 

The letters from Bice are addressed to the general 
delivery, and not to the house address of the recipient. 

It is thought possible that the owner of the trunk per- 
ished in the storm. Theories that it was blown from a 
train on the Eads bridge or a wagoi on the roadway of 
the bridge are also advanced. 

HAVLIn's TIIEATEIl DAMAGED. 

About two-thirds of the west wall of Havlin's Theater 
building fell into the alley with a crash daring the first 
storm. The section of the wall which fell left the entire 
stage exposed and the scenery and canvass decorations 
were loosened and torn down. The rent in the wall ex- 
tends from the roof to the ground. The walls which 
have remained standing are bulged and cracked* in places. 
A family residing on the third floor of the building, 
thinking the entire structure unsafe, sought other quar- 
ters. 

ENGINE HOUSE COMPLETELY DEMOLISHED. 

Engine House No. 7 was completely demolished by 
the storm. The hose reel and the horses belonging to 



382 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



it were buried under the debris iu the cellar. The engine 
had responded to an alarm of fire at Ninth and Walnut 
streets, and escaped destruction. At the time the crash 
came ^ve members of the company were in the engine 




AhL, THAT WAS I.EFT OF A BKAUTIFUL, HOME. 

house. The sound of the tower in the rear of the house 
falling gave them timely warning, and they ran out and 
escaped injury. 

Joseph Utley and "Tip" Lanham, of Engine Company 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 383 

No. 7, lost their homes and all their household belong- 
ings by the storm, though their families escaped injury. 
The men have been kept hard at work since the calamity 
rescuing people from ruins and recovering dead bodies. 

KILLED ALMOST OPPOSITE THE MORGUE. 

Josephine Martini, 19 years old, was almost instantly 
killed in her father's shop, at 402 South Twelfth street, 
by falling debris. She was attending the business. It 
is a lunch stand, the dimensions of the room being about 
4x12 feet. The flashes of lightning and peals of thunder 
frightened her and she attempted to run to the yard to 
the family's living apartments. As she reached the rear 
door the little dilapidated structure caved in and she was 
buried beneath its contents. Joe Diggs, porter at the 
morgue, dug out the lifeless body of the girl and with 
the assistance of the Superintendent of the morgue placed 
the body in an ambulance and had it conveyed to the 
Dispensary. Here the body was pronounced dead and 
removed to the Morgue. 

The girl was killed almost opposite the Morgue. The 
mother of the dead girl, hysterical with grief, saw the 
body of her daughter placed on a slab and then she 
swooned. 

PANIC AMONG LAUNDRY GIRLS. 

The scene on Grand avenue, from the Fair Grounds to 
Carondelet, after the storm, resembled the thoroughfare 
of a besieged city after a heavy bombardment by the 
enemies' guns. The street was strewn from one end to 



384 



THE gr?:at cyclone. 



the other with trees, whole trees and broken branches, 
broken telegraph, telephone and electric light poles, that 
made traffic of every kind both tedious and dangerous in 
the darkness and fallen wires, and it was with great diffi- 
culty that pedestrians wormed their way along the side- 
walks, which were strewn with debris of every descrip- 
tion. The middle of the thoroughfare was blockaded with 
electric cars of the various lines that traverse it from end 
to end, and a number of serious accidents occurred on ac- 
count of horses becoming entangled in the wires that 
strewed the ground everywhere. 

For half an hour after the storm struck the West End 
pandemonium reigned supreme at the Excelsior Laundry, 
corner of Grand and Bell avenues. Over 125 women are 
employed in this establishment, and the first gust of the 
storm crashed in the windows of the building, filling the 
air with broken glass and wrecking everything that was 
not nailed down, throwing the entire establishment into 
confusion. 

Many of the women were slightly injured by the bits of 
flying debris. All made a rush for the exits from the 
building and rent the air with their screams, and several 
who fainted were nearly trampled to death by their com- 
panions in their frantic efforts to escape. The damage to 
the building is inconsiderable, and with a few exceptions 
the women were much more frightened than hurt. 

All the streets in the West End presented a scene very 
much similar to that on Grand avenue, and in many places 
the streets were almost completely blocked with fallen 
trees, fences, poles and other debris. Chimney tops, 



THE (iKEAT C Y( LONE. ^iS.") 

window blinds, sign boards and broken glass were every- 
where, and the intense darkness and ponring rain, lighted 
up by frequent and \ ivdd flashes of lightning that blinded 
and terrified the soaking and dripping multitudes of 
working people who were compelled to grope their way 
home in the darkness and rain, made a scene that defies 
description. 

A priest's escape. 

Rev. Father Head and his sister narrowly escaped with 
their lives. Both are painfully injured, especially the 
reverend father, whose injuries are of a most dangerous 
character. The tornado tore oflp the two towers of An- 
nunciation church on Sixth street, near Chouteau avenue. 
These with the heavy bell of the church fell with a crash 
onto the three-story residence of the priest immediately 
north of the church. Thev smashed throucrli the house 
from roof to cellar. Father Head and his sister, who 
were in the room on the second story, were thrown into 
the cellar, as was their housekeeper. 

The injured ones were carried as soon as possible by 
tender hands to the residence of Dr. J. C. Lebrecht at 
Sixth and LaSalle streets, where they spent the night. 

Father Head had a terrible scalp wound six inches long 
and another in the back of his head. Both of his eyes 
are injured. His left knee is violently sprained and his 
right thumb crushed. He sustained a shock to his sys- 
tem that may prove very serious. 

Miss Head, while not so badly off, had both hips in- 
jured and is internally hurt. 

The housekeeper escaped with slight injuries. 

25 



386 



^HE GREAT CYCLONE. 



DIED IN THEIR ARMS. 

Cue of the luost affecting stories of the terrors of the 
tornado comes from members of the Fire Department 
who worked on the wreck of Anchor Hall, at the south - 




IMPERIAI^ I^AUNDRY. 



west corner of Jefferson and Park avenues. Down under 
the debris lay the body of poor Joseph Meyer, a barber 
employed in the* shop in the building. When the storm 
came up he attempted to take refuge in the basement, but 



THE grp:at cyclone. 387 

was caught in the crash before he liad reached a place of 
safety. 

The entire two upper floors came down upon him, and 
he was pinioned in the most painful position imaginable. 
He could scarcely move hand or foot, and the pressure of 
the tons of wreckasje above him was gradually crushing 
his life out. He fully realized his position, and knew 
that unless assistance reached him within a short time he 
would perish. He called to the men he heard above him 
when the storm abated, but could not make them hear. 

It was known that Meyer was under the wreck, and as 
soon as possible a rescue party was organized to search 
for his body. For long, weary hours he waited and 
listened, and as soon as he heard them coming, he called 
out the exact position where be lay, and rendered all the 
assistance his enfeebled condition would permit. As his 
r>^scuers gradually drew nearer he encouraged them and 
begged them not to give up the task. But it was slow 
work digging the mass of broken timber and brick and 
mortar out of the cellar, and day dawned before the res- 
cuers came within speaking distance of the unfortunate. 

During the long dreary night not a word of complaint 
came from the dying man, and not once did he chide them 
for not working faster. He occasionally showed the 
torture he was undergoing by groaning, but whenever 
they called to him to know if he could hold out till they 
reached him his answer was invariably that he was all 
right and that he would keep his senses about him long 
enough to direct the movements of those who were work- 
ino; to save his life. He said he wanted to see the mem- 



388 thp: great cycloxe. 

bers of his family and would not allow himself to think 
of giving up when help was so near. 

At last about nine o'clock in the morning, the last stick 
of timber was removed from the dying man's legs and he 
was carried to the sidewalk above. He smiled faintly on 
his rescuers as they bore him out of his prison, but in 
spite of his efforts to appear strong and brave it was plain 
to be seen that he could not last long, and almost in the 
arms of the men who had come to his relief he breathed 
his last. Before he died he said: "Well, boys, I did 
my best to hold out, but I guess I'm going now." 

HERO OF BALAKLAVA DEAD. 

Among the victims of the tornado was Thomas Griffin, 
ex-policeman, ex-soldier and at one time a member of the 
famous Six Hundred which made the equally famous 
charge at Balaklava. He and thi'ee daughters were 
caught like rats in a trap at their home on Seventh street, 
and were crushed beneath the walls. Griffin was one of 
the best known men in the city, and served on the police 
force for nearly eight years. During this time he was 
stationed at the approach to the Eads Bridge and was 
known by sight to thousands of strangers who visited the 
town. Griffin served with the Light Brigade during the 
battles of Balaklava, Inkerman, Sebastopol and Lucknow. 
At the time of his death he was wearing medals received 
for bravery in each of these battles. 

FOUND SAFETY IN A BASEMENT. 

The Wetzel family enjoyed the grandeur of the storm 
until the windows of their home began to give way. They 



THK GRKAT CYCLONE. B89 

saw the first chimneys of the Union Club fall, and the 
running comment at once ceased. Each member of the 
household rushed to the basement, and no sooner had 
they congregated than the walls of their home gave way. 
The loss of furniture was complete and the house a 

wreck. 

Dr. William A. McCandless, who lived in a handsome 
white stone residence of three stories adjoining the Wet- 
zels, looked at the wreck of his home, and remarked: "I 
will give all that is left to anybody who will remove the 

wreckage. " 

The McCandless household was saved by taking to tlie 
basement, for all that remains of their home are tlie 
walls. 

HOW TIIK HORSE>^ BEHAVED. 

At 2710 Lafavette is the ruin of a mammoth livery 
sta])le, ONvned by Walter S. Gregor>(. The entire second 
fioor is gone and 15 carriages are destroyed. When Mr. 
Gregory told of his loss y(^sterday his affection for the 
horsTes which had escaped unhui't was clearly apparent. 

"They knew as well as liuman beings could have 
known," said he, "that death stared them in the face. 
They were not unruly. Their piteous neigh revealed 
their fear, and they were as docile as cowed school clnld- 
ren would have been." 

In this ruined barn lay the remains of Mrs. F. D. 
Woodruff, wife of a barber at 2743 Ann avenue. When 
the storm struck her home Mrs. Woodruff was on the sec- 
ond floor of the building. Slie hastened to the rear of 



S90 



Till-: GREAT CYCLONE. 



the house, and clutching a clothes line, fastened it around 
her body. But before see could throw herself from the 
window the walls gave wrj and she was hurled to her 
death. 

Diagonally across the street from the Gregory stables 









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FOURTEENTH AND PAPIN STREETS. 



are the stables of the Compton Avenue Livery Company. 
Here but little damage was done to property, but in an 
attempt to hold the doors against the storm, Joseph Wai'- 
ren, the foreman, was struck by a piece of flying glass 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 891 

and an artery was cut in his neck. He was not expected 
to live. 

A freak of the storm was to lift the fi'ame of the ele- 
vator shaft from the Compton stables and carry it a dis- 
tance of 150 feet, when it was deposited over a telegraph 
pole. The direction taken by this shaft was southeast, 
something which cannot be explained according to any 
statements yet made as to the direction of the wind. 

MRS. eyermaWs miraculous escape. 

By far the most miraculous of all the escapes any- 
one had to tell was the story related by Mrs. Dr. C. H. 
Eyermann of 1722 South Jefferson avenue. The Eyer- 
mann's lived in a two -story brick containing nine rooms. 
The father was away from home at the time and the 
mother with her nine-year-old -son was on the second 
floor. The windows in the second story blew in and 
Mi's. Eyermann went to the first floor and took lier son 
with her. The walls in the second story began to fall 
and she went to the basement. She had left the gas 
burninscin the main hall and cautioning her son to remain 
quiet hastened above to put out the gas, for fear the house 
might be set on fire. 

No sooner had she turned out the gas than the whole 
house seemed to be giving way. She rushed down the 
stairway leading to the basement and caught her child 
just in time to force him between two pieces of masonry 
that formed a small archway underneath the hall. The 
brick house fell with a crash. Not a brick was left in 
position, and somehow, in some way, "God only knows," 



392* THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

remarked Mrs. Eyermann, neither the mother nor the 
child was injured. 

Their next endeavor was to extricate themselves. 
Above and all around them the falling bricks had gath- 
ered, but they followed the archway to the main basement 
and finally dug away enough bricks from around a win- 
dow to gain their freedom. 

Dr. Eyermann was only a couple of blocks from home 
in his buggy, but was seriously injured. 

Mrs. Eyermann sat on an improvised seat made by 
resting a board on the bricks from her home the next day 
and complacently ate supper. 

GAVE HIS LIFE TO SAVE A HORSE. 

There were many marvelous escapes along that part of 
Missouri avenue which faces the park. The home of 
Alois Solerer is a three-story brick, with imitation stone 
front, at 1401 Missouri avenue (corner of Park). The 
roof is blown away, and the family was gathered in the 
basement, while the brick and mortar fell thick about 
them. In this family group was also William Taylor, 
the negro coachman ,who had been with the family for 
years. The negro was passionately devoted to "Bess," 
the family horse, and while the storm was at its worst 
heard the animal "neigh. '^ 

It was the same piteous neigh which has already been 
described by the proprietors of several stables and Taylor 
started for the stable. The family pleaded with him in 
vain. Taylor reached the stable just in time to free 
"Bess" just before the walls gave way. Although the 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 898 

horse escaped the negro was buried in the ruins, and was 
taken out dead. 

There were some stories of miraculous escapes to tell at 
each of the houses facing Lafayette park from Missouri 
avenue, but the general tenor was the same. The people 
escaped by fleeing to the basements of their houses. 

Looking east from Park avenue the wreckage seemed 
complete. Save the one residence block which bounded 
the park on the east the others were commercial and in- 
dustrial streets. The small shop keepers along Park 
avenue, east of the park, were with their families in a sad 
mixture of children, mattresses, broken bureaus and bed- 
steads and disfigured homes. The most colossal wreck 
of the neighborhood was the big two-story, brick car 
shed of the People's railway line. It covered one full 
acre of ground, and the whole structure fell, mashing the 
cars and building into a gigantic heap of brick and mor- 
tar. It was almost impossible for one to pick his way along 
Park avenue, and the mass of humanity which struggled 
to cover the territory thereabout included every variety 
of citizenship which a big city has to oifer. 

Small boys rang the gongs and bells on the despoiled 
street cars, linemen vainly attempted to rescue such elec- 
tric wires as could be preserved. 

"saved through god's mercy." 

No one will ever satisfactorily explain how the families 
of Edward and William Rea, living across the street at 
2845 Park avenue, escaped. Their former home was a 
handsome brick, three stories high. Foui' women were 



394 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 



in the parlor when the west wall gave way and filled the 
room with brick and mortar. To look at the room and 
imagine that any one of its occupants could have escaped 
is impossible. When asked how it occurred, Mrs. Ed 




BROWN TOBACCO COMPANY'S BUII^DING. 
(FOUR PERSONS WERE KILLED IN THE WRECK ON THE RIGHT.) 

Rea said : ' 'We were saved through the mercy of God." 
Mrs. S. Collins at 2343 Park avenue is equally at a 
loss to account for the escape of herself and four daugh- 
ters. Before any one of the family attempted to take 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. H95 

refuge in the cellar the rear walls to the house gave way, 
and the furniture was scattered in all directions. Through 
the flying debris they made their way to the cellar, and no 
one was injured. Their home and furniture are totally 
destroyed. 

STRANGE BUT TRUE. 

The tornado developed hundreds of incidents so unique 
that the best of them are entitled to a chapter to them- 
selves. Since the account of the first of these strange 
storms was written, back in the days of the Marshfield and 
Grinnell disasters, stories of miraculous, unaccountable 
escapes, peculiar deaths and fantastic doings of the ele- 
ments have formed a large part of the history of every 
storm of this character. 

For example, nothing is more difficult of explanation 
than a condition which exists at the wrecked home of Dr. 
Starkloff on Compton avenue. The outer walls of the 
splendid red mansion are torn away, the roof is gone and 
there are other evidences of the ravages of the storm with- 
out the building. Yet the light pictures on the walls are 
hanging in place and the lamps on tables and stands are 
not disturbed as to position, neither are they in any way 
damaged. On one of them the delicate lace shade is not 
even disarranged. 

In South St. Louis there is a house whose entire north 
wall is torn out save a support under one of the windows 
and the window itself. The frame is not damaged and 
not one of the panes of glass is broken. 

On Russell avenue, not far from Compton, one of the 



396 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

heavy marble steps that were in front of the main door 
of the residence was picked up and the end driven into 
the ground to a depth of two feet. The step is not chip- 
ped or in any w^ay injured. 

There are two iron posts in front of the Merchants' 
Exchange building. One of them was wrenched off by 
the storm. Sixty feet away is a wooden post of the same 
size and height of the iron pillar, and it was in no way 
damaged. 

Chunks of ice, presumably from tlie Wainwright 
Brewery, were found in tlie water in Twelfth street, just 
below the Sliickle -Harrison Iron Works. 

HORSE UNHARNESSED. 

On Grand avenue, not far from Shenandoah, a horse 
was torn from its harness and thrown, upside down, in an 
excavation that is being made for a sewer. The other 
horse in the team was tossed across the street. 

A bed with its mattress in place was tlirown from a 
house on Missouri avenue to the center of Lafayette Park. 
The pillows fell not far from it, but they were not the 
pillows belonging to this particular bed. 

A child's chair was taken from one of the lamps at the 
gate leading into Lafayette Park on the south side. Part 
of an arc lamp was fastened to it. 

A middle-aged German was walking along the railroad 
tracks east of Twelfth street just after tlie storm, be- 
moaning the loss of his little daughter. Another child, 
who was with him, found a bonnet that was recognized as 
belonging to the missing girl. The father thought tliat 



THE GLEAT CYCLONE. 81)7 

it was conclusive evidence that his other youngster was 
h)st when the little one ran up and shouted that she 
wanted to get in the house, because it was getting too wet 
for her. 

Bales of hay ought to be good for defense in a cyclone. 
In many livery stables on the South Side everything but 
the great stacks of hay in the lofts was blown away. In 
one case carriages were taken half a dozen blocks and set 
down with little injury. The hay was not disturbed. 

PET CAT FOUND. 

A pet cat, owned by a family on top of Compton Hill, 
was found in front of the Lafayette Avenue Methodist 
Church at 9 o'clock Friday morning. It was not in- 
jured. 

In a house on Arkansas avenue a glass stopper in a 
whiskey decanter was broken off at the top of the bottle, 
but the vessel itself was not broken. 

A young man named Murphy of South Twenty-third 
street, says that he had two rings on his left hand. He 
lost them, with a good deal of the skin of two lingers, 
while trying to keep his hold on a telegraph pole. The 
pole was overturned and Murphy narrowly escaped being 
crushed under it. 

Letters addressed to many prominent people were 
found in the trees of Lafayette Park. One was the prop- 
erty of Mrs. Charles Nagel. 

The upper part of the stone house occupied by A. K. 
Hammond in Waverly place was torn away. A brick 
house in the same square was hardly damaged. 



398 



THE GREAT CYCLOXE. 



FRIGHTENED CHICKENS. 

Achickeucoop with two live and very much frightened 
chickens was found floating in a new -formed pool of 
water in Lafayette Park. 

Two young women who were on a Fourth sti'eet cable 




TRl-ANGLH WARKHuUoi,. 



car at the time of the storm were entirely denuded. 
They left the car stark naked and were cared for in a 
house near by. 

Black mud was found on the walls of many houses 
after the storm. In one residence on Arkansas avenue 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 399 

the ceiling is decorated with black patches. There is no 
such mud in the neighborhood. Where did this come 
from? 

There was a new spring bonnet on one of the spikes 
of the Lafayette Park iron fence. The bird on it wasn't 
stripped of its feathers. 

The irony of fate was never more forcibly illustrated 
than in case of a dwelling-house located on South Broad- 
way, the entire front of which was swept away, leaving 
the interior with furniture exposed to the elements. The 
furniture and bedding were piled in a confused mass 
upon each floor, while upon the rear wall of the second 
story bedroom was the legend, "Good Luck." 

EXCHANGE MEMBERS TIMID. 

There were great fears that the storm which unroofed 
the Merchants' Exchange had made that building unsafe, 
and at the opening the morning after the cyclone many 
of the more timid were fearful of entering. President 
Spencer at once sent for James Stewart & Co., the archi- 
tects, who made a thorough examination and reported 
that there was no danger, everything being perfectly safe, 
A notice to this effect was posted upon the bulletin board, 
which had the effect of reassuring the members. 

A large number of messages from various cities through- 
out the country were received by members of the Mer- 
chants' Exchange offering sympathy and assistance. Vice- 
President R. S. Lyons of the Chicago -Board of Trade 
wired President Spencer as follows: "The Board of 
Trade of the city of Chicago is shocked by the horrifying 



400 THE GKEAT CYCLONE. 

calamity which has befallen your city, and extends its 
sincere and warmest sympathy." A cable received by 
theE. B. White Grain Company, from Alexander <fe Co., 
of London, England, said: ^'Our sympathy extended." 

A FLYING STOOL AND A DOLL HOUSE. 

A tall office stool fell from the top of the tower of the 
McLean building. It had no mark indicating whence it 
had come. 

" Ben Selkirk's house on the north side of Park avenue 
collapsed. With strange vagary, the wind blew pieces 
of brick, limbs of trees and pieces of slate through the 
parlor windows in front, knocking the chandelier into 
smithereens, and treating handsome vases and mantle 
ornaments in the same rough way. With singular freak - 
ishness, it missed a charming little doll house, which Mr. 
Selkirk had made with his own hands for his children. 
This doll house stood, and stands now, between the two 
front windows on a table. It is as good as new, and not 
even a drop of water got on it to mar its whiteness. 

THREE LITTLE ONES DIED. 

A touching incident occurred at the Bethesda Home 
during the prevalence of the tornado. The home is at 
Twelfth and Hickory in the line of the storm, but escaped 
uninjured. It was rocked and badly shaken, but none of 
the inmates were injured. Sad to say, however, three 
children died during the storm. Some think the deaths 
were caused by fright, but others say the children we»'e 
dying before the storm broke. The death scenes were 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 401 

impressive. Outside the thunder roared, the lightning 
flashed, and crash after crash of thunder shook the 
home. The little ones looked into the faces of the 
nurses, appeared at first startled and then smiling peace- 
fully they passed to the other world at the same moment 
other souls were being hurled into eternity by the fierce- 
ness of the storm and the unmerciful strength of the 
wind. 

BLOWN INTO THE RIVER. 

Jim Murray, employed on the Anchor Line wharf - 
boat, was sitting on the wharf boat when the tornado de- 
scended on the Levee. Foreseeing the danger, Murray 
made a run for the shelter of the elevated road. The 
wind gratified his desire to seek this shelter, but not be- 
fore it had some fun with him. Murray was lifted oft' 
his feet and blown over the "apron" of the boat into the 
river, landing in a dry dock moored close by, used by 
carpenters to repair the hulls of vessels. The next in- 
stant the dry dock, which is a hollow aftair about 10 feet 
wide by 15 feet long, was blown westward out of the 
water, tearing off a portion of the railing of the "apron." 
It was driven with great violence against the iron sup- 
ports of the elevated railway, dumping Murray out uncere- 
moniously upon the ground. The dry dock was again 
taken up in a return current of wind and carried out to- 
wards the river almost to the water's edge, where it was 
caught by a reverse current, whirled high into the air 
and dashed to pieces against tlie roadbed of the elevated, 
scattering debris all over the wharf. Murray was dazed 

26 



402 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



and pretty sorely bruised, but not injured otherwise, and 
he held on with a death grip to the Terminal elevated 
support until the storm had spent itself. 

PAPER hanger's experience. 

During the height of the storm Wednesday a paper- 




WRECKED AND BI^ISTERED. 

hanger named Stewart was decorating the walls of Ed 
Morrissey's saloon, opposite the Four Courts. When the 
front walls of the restaurant blew in and scattered del^ris 
through the house Stewart fled to the cellar. When his 
two assistants decided to follow him a few minutes later, 
they were convulsed with laughter at observing him 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 403 

stretched prone upon his back in the damp cellar, the 
water reaching nearly above his arms, with two heavy 
stones across his breast, which he had placed there to pre- 
vent the wind from blowing him away. Despite the 
"jibes" of the other occupants of the house Stewart con- 
tinued to occupy his uncomfortable position until assured 
that all danger was past. 

SAVED HIS DKINK. 

Henry Collins of East St. Louis, tells a queer story of 
his experience during the storm. He was standing in a 
saloon in East St. Louis with a glass of liquor in his 
hand. Suddenly the roof fell in, he was turned over 
twice or thrice and landed on his feet with the glass still 
in his hand and half of the liquor still in it. He quaifed 
the liquor with relish, as his collarbone had been broken 
in the crash and he needed the stimulant. 

WEDGED IN A CAR ROOF. 

Mrs. R. P. Tansey, wife of the president of the Mer- 
chants' Transfer Company, well known in St. Louis so- 
cial circles, but now a resident of Springfield, Illinois, 
was a passenger on the Chicago and Alton train that be- 
came tangled up with the tornado on the eastern end of the 
Eads Bridge. When the coaches turned over Mrs. Tan- 
sey, in some way, became wedged in the roof of one of 
them and there was considerable difficulty in extricating 
her; as it was, one of the brakemen finally pulled her 
through a window and she then footed it over the cross- 
ties in that overwhelming downpour of rain to East St, 



404 THE (JKEAT CYCLONE. 

Louis and tried to find the Martell House, but only suc- 
ceeded in reaching the spot where it had once stood. 
How she ever got to St. Louis she does not know, but 
late in the evening she made her way to the Planters' 
Hotel, more dead than alive, where her anxious husband 
found her the next morning. 

DIED FROM FRIGHT. 

In Clifton Heights an old lady living in a house in the 
rear of the residence of L. Haller was killed by the shock 
experienced when an uprooted tree was dropped through 
the roof. She was not struck or injured in any way by 
fallino; debris, but her nervous system had been so shat- 
tered by the intensity of the storm that the additional 
strain was too much for her. 

IN A FIRE -PROOF VAULT. 

There were lively times in the General Auditor's office 
of the Missouri Pacific system on South Seventh street. 
On the second floor of the building there is a very large 
fire-proof vault, and when the winds were raging the 
fiercest, fifteen of the clerks sought refuge in it. The 
building, however, began to shake and quiver, and the 
strong vault began to totter in sympathy with the move- 
ment, which brought forth a howl of anguish from the 
imprisoned men. It was then too late to run for their 
lives, and all they could do was to stay with the safe. 
Luckily, the building was spared and no one was liurt. 
This building is probably packed and jammed with cler- 
ical occupants more than any other building of the same 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 405 

size in this city, and when the roof was taken away by 
the storm, the panic grew into the proportions of a small 
sized riot of frantic, safety-seeking people. 

TWO women's ESCAPE. 

When the steamer Dolphin was taken in hand by the 
wind, and before being consigned to a watery resting 
place, it was dashed against one of the piers of the Eads 
bridge, where the force of the storm held it for a moment. 
J. W. Schoeffer, of General Manager Ramsey's office of 
the Wabash was on the bridge at the time, and saw two 
women crawl quickly from the steamer onto a ledge of 
rocks in the pier, where they clung and huddled until a 
rope was thrown to them from above. The boat, a mo- 
ment or two after the women had gotten clear of it, was 
again put in action by the elements, turned upside down 
and capsized in the middle of the river. 

SIR CHARLES GIBSON's TREES. 

One of the prides of Sir Charles Gibson— a greater 
pride than even the title he possesses, but never displays 

were the trees that surrounded his beautiful home just 

across from the southwest corner of Lafayette Park. 
Reaching Lawyer Gibson's house, after a walk up La- 
fayette avenue of 20 or more blocks, the beholder was 
almost accustomed to the sight of fallen houses, and so 
the fact that the grand old trees were torn up by the roots 
seemed more impressive than the fact that the beautiful 
home they shaded was a total wreck, and its usual happy 
occupants obliged to seek shelter elsewhere in the city. 



406 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



There were stories told by the collectiou of rubbish, 
piled like the drift that waves of the sea wash ashore, 
that bordered Lafayette Park, particularly on the south- 
ern side. Bits of dainty millinery, lying in close prox- 
imity to broken hat boxes, told the tale of festive spring 







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ST. LOUIS WIR:e MILIvS. 



and summertime headgear that nnist forevermore remain 
nothing but memories. 

Tiny crib mattresses, caught in a tangle of shattered 
pieces of woodwork and fallen limbs of trees, hinted so 
plainly at the possibility of a wee bit of humanity being 
hurled without mercy through the air, that one hesitated 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 407 

to contiaue investigation for fear of uncovering suddenly 
a pale little face. 

The bits of polished wood, with handsome metal han- 
dles attached, that still retained shape enough to be dis- 
tinguished as a lady's writing desk, accounted for a lit- 
tering of torn letters and envelopes, bearing the name 
and address, as closer observation disclosed, of Mrs. 
Charles Nagel. Of course, it goes without saying the 
desk was caught and blown from its place in the residence 
opposite the park, which is now among the ruined. 

COLORED VICTIMS. 

The colored people along Papin and Gratiot streets 
could be seen for blocks in the half open or entirely un- 
covered and unsided houses gathering together their be- 
longings. 

On the north side of Papin, Gratiot and Caroline streets 
nearly all the front walls are out, while on the other side 
of these streets all the w^ay up from Jefferson avenue the 
people are saved the trouble of raising their windows. 
They were all leaning out of the empty frames, watching 
the slow and tedious clearing up process of their neigh- 
bors across the way. 

WILLIE WINCKLER's DEATH. 

Poor Willie Winckler, nephew of Adolphus Busch, 
was in high glee all day Wednesday. Early in the morn- 
ing he received a cablegram announcing the safe arrival 
in Kreuznach, Germany, of his wife, to whom he had 
been married a little over a year. In the evening he got 



408 THE GREAT CVfT.ONE. 

on the Seventh street electric car to take tlie cablegram up 
to his mother-in-law, Mrs. Meyer, that she, too, might be 
apprised of the safe arrival of her daughter among her 
husband's people. He had been on the car but a little 
while when the storm broke loose. Mr. Winckler, the 
conductor told his relatives afterwards, was exceedingly 
nervous, and could hardly be restrained from jumping off 
the car. Finally he managed to swing off, the conductor 
still urging him to remain inside. Just then a terrific 
blow of the hurricane overturned the car, and Mr. Winck- 
ler was buried under it. When the debris was removed 
he was dead. 

ACTS OF HEROISM. 

Many heroic acts were performed in the saving of lives 
as a result of the storm. 

When the City of Monroe was twisted away from the 
Anchor Line wharf ^ there were about 40 passengers on 
board and a full crew, as the boat was just making ready 
for the trip to New Orleans. When the moorings finally 
gave way the boat lurched over on its starboard side and 
nearly capsized. The movement threw nearly all the 
freight to the starboard side and this served to hold the 
boat in this perilous position. Captain Viegler made a 
reassuring speech to the passengers which slightly 
quieted the extreme excitement, lie said they were all 
safe. When the boat struck the Illinois bank the captain 
was not to be found. 

At 7:30 o'clock Wednesday night, at whidi time the 
last news from the boat was received in St. Louis, he had 



THE grp:at cyclone. 4(19 

not been found, and it is feared lie was blown overboard. 
Fred W. Williams, a colored roustabout on the boat, saved 
four lives, all of children. Mrs. Mary Mannle, of 111 
Collinsville avenue. East St. Louis, and her four children 
had been placed on the boat at 3 o'clock by their husband 
and father, Joseph Mannle. They were going to visit 
relatives at Cairo, 111. Mrs. Mannle, with her children 
huddled close about her, was on the lower deck, await- 
ing, as she supposed, sure death. When the boat 
grounded, Williams, in answer to her appeals, grabbed 
one of the children and plunged overboard. A few 
strokes brought the little one safely to land, and Williams 
made three other trips, landing the other childi'en on the 
river bank. He performed this act of heroism in the 
midst of the storm, when there was the likelihood that 
the boat would be capsized every moment. When the 
wind had spent itself, the other passengers were landed in 
safety. Mannle, the father and husband, was soon on the 
scene, and Williams was the object of general worship at 
the Mannle homestead that night. 

SAVED HIS captain's SON. 

On the Libbie Conger, which was ground to pieces on 
the Illinois shore, were Captain Seaman, his wife and his 
child, a little boy who is a general favorite on board the 
boat. When the worst appeared to be coming, a negro, 
whose name is unknown, took the child in his arms and 
plunged overboard bearing the captain's boy safely 
through the boiling waters to the Illinois shore. Captain 
Seaman rescued his wife. But for the act of bravery of 



410 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 



one of liis roustabouts his boy would probably be among 
the missing. 

When John McDowell, a roustabout on the tug Reli- 
ance, which performed great work among the boats which 
lined the Illinois banks for miles down the river, returned 




COMING HOME AFTER THE STORM, 



to the city, he was burdened with messages to loved ones 
in this city from fathers and brothers telling of their 
safety. He brought happier news to many households 
than was ever brought to them before. 

He reported that the Madill had been blown to pieces 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 411 

and that the crew swam ashore. He said he thought every 
member of the crew had escaped with life. The ferries 
at the foot of Anna street and at East Carondelet had 
been blown to pieces and gone to the bottom with their 
crews and passengers. This could not be verified, but 
the negro stated positively that such was the case. 

There was a rumor that the excursion steamer Grand 
Republic, belonging to the Columbia Excursion Com- 
pany, had gone to the bottom with 500 excursionists. 
An officer of the company denied this. He said the boat 
left St. Louis at noon to go to Alton, where it was 
engaged for an excursion at 8 o'clock that night. The 
storm might have blown the boat away, but in such exi- 
gency only the crew would have been imperiled and these 
men could all have swam to safety. 

CABBY WAS AN AUTOCRAT. 

The hotels and lodging houses down town were crowded 
to their full capacity the night of the storm. The Olive 
street cable line was the only dependence for those who 
live in western part of the city. To the south there was no 
street car communication and operation of the suburban 
street car lines was suspended. There was no way for 
thousands of men and women who work in the city to get 
to their homes save by cabs, and every cab in town was 
busily engaged.the^greater part of the night, though driv- 
ing in the dark streets was dangerous. Old express 
wagons, furniture vans and every other sort of vehicle 
was pressed into service during the early evening hours. 
Many anxious to get home and assure themselves of the 



412 THE GREAT CYCLONE. 

safety of their families paid as high as 110 for a ride in 
a grocery wagon. Prices for cabs were correspondingly 
steep, and cabs were hard to get at that. 

DYING IN A DRUG STORE. 

Agonizing groans emanating from Leland Miller's 
drug store at about 9 o'clock in the evening attracted the 
attention of passers by, who soon learned of the terrible 
suffering of G. C. Poppitz, another tornado victim. He 
was walking aimlessly up Locust Street from Broadway 
at about 8 o'clock, and when he reached the corner on 
Sixtli in front of the drug store, he dropped to the side- 
walk unconscious. One of the clerks of tlie store assisted 
him inside, and I'estoratives were promptly administered. 

The suffering man regained consciousness at times, 
but talked incoherently. He said he had walked from 
East St. Louis, but did not remember how he had crossed 
the river. Later in the evenino^ he said he was struck 
in the side while riding in a car, but he could not recall 
what had hit him. 

An examination of the injured man showed that he was 
fatally injured, his entire right side and ribs being 
crushed in and his lungs apparently compressed. He 
expectorated blood continually. The attending physi- 
cian pronounced his case hopeless. 

A carriage was dispatched to his home at 2501 South 
Broadway with a messenger to notify the parents of the 
unfortunate young man, but up to 10 o'clock nothing had 
been heard from them or the messenger. 

Young Poppitz is a graduate of the College of Phar- 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 413 

macy, of the class of '96, and appeared to be about 21 
years of age. His father is in the furniture business, 
being a member of the firm of Kluegel & Poppitz, whose 
store is at 2501 South Broadway. 

A PANIC AVERTED. 

Captain Pat Carmody's presence of mind prevented a 
panic at the Fair Grounds. When the crowd stampeded 
for protection from the tornado, Pat coiralled the fright- 
ened people underneath the stand and forced them to re- 
main there. He had a mob of about 300 in check, and 
it w^as lucky for them that he did so. Everybody was 
trying to get out and wanted to make a break for the 
south side of the stand. While Carmody was hokling 
them back, the roof of the stand was blown off, and the 
debris fell just where the people wanted to go. Car- 
mody's good judgment saved many lives. 

Dan Honig, the well-known horseman, fainted away 
during the height of the storm. Dan is a robust-built 
man, but he is subject to heart failure, and his friends 
thought he was a "dead one." 

When the stand fell R. J. Pearson's horse and buggy 
was caught in the debris and completely buried. The 
big posts saved the horse and he was all right when dug 
out. His escape was simply miraculous. 

Drs. Bernays, Newman and Neville made a tour of the 
track after the tornado and found no one injured. 

Hundreds gathered in the infield when the storm blew 
up and were thoroughly drenched. Frank James found 
a hill and located close to it. He ordered the people to 



414 



THE (JREAT CYCLONE. 



lie down on the grass and everybody took his advice. 
The roof of the stand was blown in all directions. Part 
of it landed on Natural Bridge road and several shanties 
were buried beneath the debris. The bookmakers lefi 
the betting ring in a rush and their cashiers flew with 




.SINGUIvAR FREAK OF THE WIND. 



them. In the crush a number lost part of their bankrolls 
and the touts had a scramble for the coin. 

Mra. Charles Tan Dusen, wife of the well-known jockey, 
was caught in the stampede and knocked down. She lost 
her pocketbook containing $110. Another woman fi'om 



THE GREAT CYCLONE. 415 

San Francisco lost her purse, which, it is said, contained 
several hundred dollars worth of diamonds. The lady 
had a little child with her and the youngster behaved 
with startling bravery. 

One of the supporting pillars of the stand fell through 
the first fioor when the roof went off and a number had 
narrow escapes from being crushed to death. Johnie 
Goebel, one of the form book men, was near by at the 
time and had the narrowest escape of his life. 

The awning over the club house veranda was blown off. 
It suffered the same fate last season. 

Clayton Woods, who works for one of the books, was 
trying to get out of the betting ring during the height^ of 
the storm when a bettor asked him to pay off a winning 
ticket on one of the horses in the fifth race. 

"Pay off!" said Clayton; "not for me. I guess we 
will all have to account this time to the main squeeze 
up above. " 

George Munson and Secretary AuU were hard at work 
trying to quiet people after the worst of it w^as over. 
Munson was drenched to the skin. 

train's narrow escape. 

While the storm was at its height , passenger train 
No. 7 of the Chicago and Alton road pulled out of the 
bridge from the Missouri side on its way east. Engineer 
William Swoncutt had only proceeded a short distance 
when he realized the awful danger which threatened the 
train. The wind struck the coaches at first, startlingly, 
causing them to careen omuiously. At that time he was 



7fyf 



416 THE grp:at cycloxk. 



about half way across. Overhead telegraph poles were 
snapping and tumbling into the river, while several large 
stones were shaken loose from their foundations and came 
toppling down into the water. Fearing that every mo- 
ment his train would either be blown into the water or 
else the bridge would be blown away beneath him. Swon- 
cutt, with rare presence of mind, put on a full head of 
steam in an effort to make the Illinois shore. 

The train had scarcely proceeded 200 feet, and when 
within about the same distance from the shore an entire 
upper span of the driveway of the bridge was blown away. 
Tons and tons of huge granite blocks tumbled to the 
tracks, where the train loaded with passengers had been 
but a moment before. At about the same instant the 
wind struck the train full on the side, upsetting all the 
cars like playthings. Luckily no one was killed in the 
wreck, but several were taken out severely injured. 

The wrecked part of the bridge is just east of the big 
tower, near the Illinois shore, and extends east for about 
300 feet. The entire upper portion, traversed by the cars 
and carriages, is carried away, while the tracks beneath 
are buried in debris, in some places eight feet high. 

FOUND A DEAD BABY. 

An unknown man who came into the Union Station at 
7 o'clock to meet his wife, who was expected on an eve- 
ning train, reported that he picked up a dead baby in the 
street at Twenty-second and Market streets. He gave it 
to a woman, who said she thought it was the child of a 
woman living near that corner. 



